Thomson-Reuters (a newswire agency) reported today that its gauge of retail sales in the month of February was up 4.0% vs. 2.9%. Retail sales have now been up 6 months in a row after 12 consecutive down months.
Analysis: While 4.0% up is encouraging I have to point out that the 4.0% up is compared to last year’s February sales, which were dismal. So the advance in the Thomson-Reuters figure is nice information, but it really is a normal sized increase over what was a terrible number a year ago.
My concern however, is that consumer confidence plunged last month. That is typically a harbinger of very poor consumer spending. Ergo, this number may not be so good this month. I am anticipating that retail sales will likely taper off for the month of March. The all important number remains the unemployment rate (see the post above).
Importance grade: 6; retail sales last month are nice, but that number happened concurrently with the massive ~18% drop in consumer confidence.
Jason
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