Commerce returns to the pre-crisis period and gives industry a break
Valor Econômico 04/17/2009
The adjustment of stocks which has taken place in the last months and retail's maintenance of the pre-crisis rhythm have produced a setting that allows the recovery of the industry starting in April. The data disclosed by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) yesterday indicates that, altogether, commerce ended February with a volume of sales slightly above the performance of September (0.8% in the series with seasonal adjustment), confirming that the slowdown in the consumption was much less intense and slower than industry's. In the same comparison, the industrial production of February was still 13.5% smaller than the production of September, in the pre-crisis period, also in the series free of seasonal influences.
Such difference confirms that industry has been much more affected by the fall in the exports than by that of the domestic market. Among economists the perspective of a slow recovery beginning in the second quarter has become stronger, an evaluation supported by the known indicators of March, like the production of cars, steel and corrugated fiberboard and energy consumption. This resumption should bring along the reduction of the distance between the production and consumption performances. According to the data of the IBGE, from September to February, the industrial production index, with seasonal adjustment, fell 22.09 points, going from 130.9 to 108.81 - a 13.5% fall. Commerce, on its turn, showed a slow deceleration, resuming the pre-crisis level already in February. In the meantime, the index increased 1.2 point, to 150.76 points. The recovery of commerce, on the average, disguises differences among the segments. The resumption is concentrated in the sales of hypermarkets and supermarkets (foods, basically). But even in the sectors with weaker February than September, the fall is always much smaller than industry's.