U.S. Retail Sales Unexpectedly Fall the Most in Nine Years

[marmar]

(Bloomberg) U.S. retail sales unexpectedly fell in December, posting the worst drop in nine years in a sign of slower economic momentum at year-end amid financial market turmoil and the government shutdown.

The value of overall sales fell 1.2 percent from the prior month after a downwardly revised 0.1 percent increase in November, according to Commerce Department figures released Thursday after a four-week delay due to the shutdown. That missed all economist estimates in a Bloomberg survey that had called for a 0.1 percent gain.

Stock futures erased gains, Treasuries rose and the dollar fell, as the broad weakness across most sectors added to signs that U.S. economic growth is cooling from prior quarters -- potentially by more than projected. It may reinforce investor expectations that the Federal Reserve will hold off on raising interest rates this year amid concern about trade and global growth.

“These numbers are horrible,” said Ward McCarthy, chief financial economist at Jefferies LLC. “It appears to contrast quite sharply with reports of Christmastime sales that were generally seen as quite healthy,” and for the Fed, “rate normalization is on the back burner for a long time to come.” ...............(more)

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-14/u-s-retail-sales-fall-most-in-nine-years-amid-stock-plunge?srnd=premium

[Wounded Bear]

1. The Trump Slump is coming...

Signs are all over, no matter what the Trump admin likes to spin.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. It's already here. Our business has dropped to half of

normal over the last few months. We're barely scraping by, and big expenses like appliance replacements keep cropping up. Our credit card companies just love us!!

[exboyfil]

3. Correction - The Democratic House of Representatives slump

Just wait for it. It will be a thing.

[Achilleaze]

4. "This is all my fault." - KGOP Comrade Dirty Donny* (R)

* aka republican Draft-dodger-in-Chief

[Sherman A1]

5. Noted this early in the morning on my news feed

and it certainly is not a good sign.

[bdamomma]

6. Well if they weren't screwing the Middle Class

and we had the means/monetary funds to buy products to get the economy going but these filthy slime balls don't fucking understand that.

We are the ones who keep the economy going.

[democratisphere]

9. When we have a 70% consumer based economy and you kill

the ability for the consumer to consume, WTF do they think is going to happen?

[crazycatlady]

7. Sales are definitely down in my Etsy shop

[Hermit-The-Prog]

8. Moscow Mitch and the Russiapublicans are happy

They've robbed the poor, fed the rich, and have their propaganda network all set to blame the Democrats.

[Codeine]

10. January and February are going to be shitty as well.

This run of bad weather is kicking retail in the ass at the moment. My sales commission checks are looking remarkably anemic right now.

[Hortensis]

11. Economists were at first projecting drop in GDP from the shutdown

at around 0.5% per month and then around 0.5% each 2 weeks -- twice as bad. For perspective, 2017 growth in GDP was 2.2%.

Don't know how much of this is from that, but next of course will come the tax-scam effect.