- Headline manufacturing sales rose 0.8% in August
- Volume sales increased 0.6%
- Auto sales rebounded after shutdowns ended
The bounce-back in August manufacturing sales (from a 1.3% drop the prior month) was largely as-expected. Transitory summer motor vehicle assembly shutdowns weighed on output in July and a resumption of activity contributed to an increase in August. Still, sales were also up 0.7% excluding the motor vehicle. Controlling for price-effects, sale volumes were up 0.6% from July, and 1.1% ahead of year-ago levels. That is admittedly an uninspiring growth rate. But it still leaves the manufacturing sector looking relatively resilient given sharper deterioration in the industrial sectors of global peers – most significantly for Canada, in the United States – alongside escalating global trade tensions.
Canada’s manufacturing sector will not be immune to those external headwinds, but to-date economic growth data has held up okay. Labour markets have looked outright solid, and although manufacturing production has been sluggish, the 70% of the economy that is the services sector has continued to hum along. Risks to the go-forward outlook abound, but we continue to track a respectable 1.8% increase in GDP in Canada in Q3.
