Experts say an uptick in the retail sales reports suggest the beginnings of the end of the Economic wobbla.
Check it. Retail sales up modestly but recovery advances.
“Retail sales rose less than expected in January, hurt by discounting in the auto sector, but a rebound in an underlying measure of sales suggested a solid underpinning for the economy’s recovery.”
Check it. US Census Bureau News (pdf*) – JANUARY 2012.
“Advance Monthly Sales for Retail and Food Servies
The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for January, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $401.4 billion, an increase of 0.4 percent (±0.5%)* from the previous month and 5.8 percent (±0.7%) above January 2011.”
Dissent:
Check it. Unadjusted January Retail Sales Post Biggest Sequential Plunge In History.
“…the Census Bureau may ramped up its seasonal adjustment “fudge factoring” because when looking at the January headline retail sales data, which naturally was a smoothly continuous line on a Seasonally Adjusted basis, rising from $399.9 billion in December to $401.4 billion in January, something rather odd happened in the Unadjusted data set: the plunge from $459.8 billion in December to $361.4 billion in January, or -$98.5 billion in one month, was the biggest one month drop in retail sales in history. “