Manufacturing sales in Canada rose 2.1 per cent to $53.0-billion in September.Mark Spowart/The Globe and Mail
Canadian factory sales advanced in September, the eighth gain in nine months, on an increase in aerospace receipts.
Manufacturing sales rose 2.1 per cent to $53.0-billion, after a revised 3.5 per cent August decline, Statistics Canada said today from Ottawa. Economists in a Bloomberg News survey forecast factory sales would increase 1 per cent in September, the median of 15 responses.
Policymakers are counting on sustained gains in exports and business investment to return the economy to full output over the next two years. The report suggests that makers of non– energy products such as airplanes and car parts may be stepping up, just as lower oil prices curb Canada's energy sales.
Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz should be "comforted by the broadening in activity away from the energy complex that will face significant headwinds heading into the end the of the year," David Tulk, chief Canada macro strategist at TD Securities in Toronto, wrote in a research note.
Transportation equipment sales gained 9.5 per cent to C$9.9-billion, led by a 22 per cent increase in the aerospace sub– category, the agency said. A recent depreciation in the Canadian dollar versus the U.S. dollar was responsible for much of that rise, the agency said.
"U.S. economic outperformance will always have a strong positive effect on Canadian exports and broader output," Nick Exarhos, an economist at CIBC World markets in Toronto, said by telephone.
Excluding autos and parts, sales rose 1.6 per cent to C$46-billion in September, Statistics Canada said. From a year earlier, manufacturing sales rose 7.3 per cent.