A rebound in the automotive sector and continued growth in the building materials sector boosted Canadian wholesale sales in December, Statistics Canada said today.

Wholesale sales rose 0.4% in December to $40.4 billion, after declining 0.3% in November. Most of the overall increase posted in December was attributable to two sectors: automotive products and building materials.

Excluding the automotive products sector, wholesale sales declined 0.5% in December, after rising 1% the previous month.

Sales rose in only two of the seven sectors in December, which accounted for approximately 34% of total sales. The sectors showing increases were automotive products, up 4.1%, and building materials, up 3.1%).

The sectors posting the largest declines were personal and household goods, down 3.8%, and farm products, down 8.1%.

In constant prices, wholesale sales increased by 1.4% in December.

Wholesale sales reached $470.3 billion in 2005, up 5.4% compared with a year earlier but lower than the 6.5% growth observed in 2004.

In 2005, the main beneficiaries of growth were wholesalers in the machinery and equipment group.

In the last three months of 2005, the value of wholesale sales rose to $120.9 billion, up 2.3% from the previous quarter.

StatsCan said this sizable gain was attributable in part to the strong performance of the personal and household goods sector, which posted quarterly growth of 5.7%. The building materials sector also registered a solid 4.8% gain.