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US business inventories up 0.9 per cent
US business inventories rose in January to their highest level in two years and sales increased at their fastest pace in nine months, a government report has shown.
The data suggests that restocking will boost growth in the first quarter of 2011.
The US Commerce Department said inventories rose 0.9 per cent to $1.45 trillion (£900bn), the highest since January 2009, after increasingly by an upwardly revised 1.1 per cent rise in December.
Economists polled by Reuters had forecast inventories rising 0.7 per cent after a previously reported 0.8 per cent increase in December.