U.S. inventory investment slows down in Q4 2017

U.S. inventory investment slowed in the fourth quarter of 2017. This has resulted in a 0.7 percentage point drag on the GDP growth for the period. A less of decline in inventories was expected and thus a smaller drag on GDP. The report of December business inventories indicated a larger-than-expected rise that implies the next revision to GDP might indicate a smaller inventory drag after all, noted Wells Fargo in a research report.

A rebound in the pace of sales in the past year has aided in bringing down the inventory-to-sales ratio on trend. This downward trend for the inventory-to-sales ratio is also clear when it is broken out for the wholesale, retail and the manufacturing sectors. This implies that businesses are justified in ratcheting up inventories slow over the next year or so, stated Wells Fargo.

At 21:00 GMT the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of US Dollar was highly bearish at -175.779. For more details on FxWirePro's Currency Strength Index, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex

FxWirePro launches Absolute Return Managed Program. For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/invest