Retail sales were up according to US Census. Our analysis agrees although the amount of improvement was less. There was moderate upward backward revision in the unadjusted data – but it was much less than the headline seasonally adjusted data. Even with this improvement in retail sales, the 3 month rolling average of sales growth continued to decelerate.
Econintersect Analysis:
- unadjusted sales rate of growth accelerated 0.8% month-over-month, and up 2.6% year-over-year.
- unadjusted sales 3 month moving year-over-year average growth decelerated 0.4% month-over-month to 2.3% year-over-year.
Advance Retail Sales Year-over-Year Change – Unadjusted (blue line), Unadjusted with Inflation Adjustment (red line), and 3 Month Rolling Average of Unadjusted (yellow line)
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- unadjusted sales (but inflation adjusted)Â up 2.2% year-over-year
- backward revisions were up moderately;
- autos were the big driver this month in growth with gasoline sales contracting.
U.S. Census Headlines:
- seasonally adjusted sales up 1.1% month-over-month, up 3.8% year-over-year
- the market was expecting between 0.5% to 1.5% month-over-month seasonally adjusted sales increase (consensus 1.0%) versus the 1.1% reported.
Year-over-Year Change – Unadjusted Retail Sales (blue line) and Inflation Adjusted Retail Sales (red line)
Unadjusted retail sales 3 month rolling average now appears to have a downward trend for the last 3 months. Retail sales per capita also seems to be in a long term downtrend (but short term trends vary depending on periods selected).
Year-over-Year Change – Per Capita Seasonally Adjusted Retail Sales
From the U.S. Census Bureau press release:
The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for March, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $433.9 billion, an increase of 1.1 percent (±0.5%) from the previous month, and 3.8 percent (±0.7%) above March 2013. Total sales for the January 2014 through March 2014 period were up 2.5 percent (±0.4%) from the same period a year ago. The January 2014 to February 2014 percent change was revised from +0.3 percent (±0.5%)* to +0.7 percent (±0.2%).
Retail trade sales were up 1.1 percent (±0.5%) from February 2014, and 3.7 percent (±0.7%) above last year. Auto and other motor vehicle dealers were up 9.5 percent (±3.2%) from March 2013 and nonstore retailers were up 7.8 percent (±2.5%) from last year.
