British retail sales rebounded in November, up 0.3 percent month on
month, though economists on Thursday said growth had slowed and may have
peaked, leading to predictions of a post-Christmas fall in
sales.Consensus expectation had been for growth of 0.3 percent in
November,leave it in the freezer andkey programmer cookies
to bake fresh whenever you need them during the holidays. set against a
fall of 0.9 percent in October.Blerina Uruci, British economist with
Barclays Economics Research, said the overall performance of retail
spending for the first two months of final quarter of 2013 remained
subdued, with the three months to November seeing sales volumes fall
marginally. Robust growth seen during the second and third quarter had
flattened out."Although November data reported a small rebound from the
large fall of the previous month, the overall picture for Q4 remains
subdued in our view and in contrast with the solid pick-up in consumer
demand we have seen in recent months," said Uruci.The weakness in retail
sales is broadly in line with weak real incomes, an historic low of 0.8
percent against a background of falling CPI at 2.1 percent.
Uruci
said this was likely to act as a continuing drag on household
demand."The economic outlook has improved, and higher confidence may
have given a boost to consumer spending as the need for discretionary
spending diminishes and employment prospects pick up. The recovery in
household demand is likely to be sustained, but it is unlikely to be
especially strong by historical standards," said Uruci.The monthly
growth in volumes was strong in clothing stores and online in general,
but offset by weak household goods and petrol sales. Internet sales
continued to grow as a proportion of total retail sales reaching a
record 11.9 percent of total.Non-food sales are on an upward trend, but
food sales have dropped after strong sales sparked by good summer
weather.John Zhu,x431 UK economist with HSBC Global Research, said, "There are reports that retailers are being forced to discount heavily again,GM TECH2 which
could drive volumes during the Christmas/January sales season.""Unless
earnings start to grow more rapidly, the modest trend may continue and
limit the upside to retail sales. We may yet see a post-Christmas
hangover," he added.
No comments:
Post a Comment