Canada Wholesale Sales Climb 0.5% in August

Wholesale transactions in Canada climbed in August on demand for textiles, clothing and motor vehicles.

Wholesale transactions rose 0.5% on a seasonally adjusted basis in August to 57.06 billion Canadian dollars ($45.28 billion), Statistics Canada said Monday. Market expectations were for not immediately available.

July's data were revised upward to indicate wholesale transactions rose by 1.7% in the month versus an earlier estimate of a 1.5% gain.

In volume, or price-adjusted, terms, August wholesale transactions increased 0.4% from the previous month.

On a 12-month basis, wholesale trade in Canada rose 10.1%.

Wholesale trade is the largest component of Canada's services sector--which in turn accounts for two-thirds of the country's economic output. Wholesalers tend to move merchandise in large quantities to institutional, industrial and retail clients. Markets tend to overlook the wholesale-trade data, even though it has a bigger weight in gross domestic product than the more closely watched retail sales.

August retail sales fell 0.3%, according to data released last week.

Write to Paul Vieira at Paul.vieira@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 23, 2017 09:13 ET (13:13 GMT)