By Paul Vieira
OTTAWA–Canadian manufacturing shipments climbed in March, ahead of the market consensus, on broad-based gains led by higher prices for energy products and primary metals.
Canadian factory sales rose 2.5% in February from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted 70.2 billion Canadian dollars, or the equivalent to US$54.38 billion, Statistics Canada said Monday. Market expectations were for a 2% advance, according to economists at Bank of Nova Scotia.
The previous month’s data were also revised higher, and now indicate factory sales rose 5.1% in February versus the earlier estimate of a 4.2% gain.
On a price-adjusted, or volume, basis, Canadian manufacturing sales in March were flat relative to the previous month.
On a one-year basis, nominal factory shipments climbed 18.7%, and while price-adjusted sales edged 1.8% higher.
“It is clear that prices played a big part and as such implications for monthly real gross domestic product may be smaller than it appears from the headline figures,” said Karyne Charbonneau, economist at CIBC Capital Markets.
On a quarterly basis, sales rose 6.5% on a nonannualized basis in the first quarter, the seventh consecutive quarterly gain and the largest increase since the third quarter of 2020.
Statistics Canada said that 16 of the 21 sectors tracked reported increased sales in March. The capacity-utilization rate, on an unadjusted basis, for Canada’s factory sector rose to 81.7% in March, the highest rate in nearly three years.
Write to Paul Vieira at [email protected]
