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U.S. Retail Sales Fall 0.3% In September
By Kitco NewsWednesday October 15, 2014 8:30 AM
(Updates with new information, commentary from CIBC)
(Kitco News) -The U.S. Census Bureau said retail sales fell 0.3% in September as sales of cars, trucks and gasoline fell.
August retail sales were left unchanged at 0.6%. Total retail sales were $$442.7 billion on a seasonally adjusted basis. Versus September 2013, retail sales were up 4.3%.
According to consensus reports, economists expected retail sales between a drop of 0.1% and a rise of 0.3%.
September’s core retail sales - excluding autos – decreased 0.2%, versus August’s increase of 0.3%. Heading into the report, economists expected core sales between being flat and up 0.9%.
Andrew Grantham, analyst at CIBC Economics, said retail sales were just one piece of overall disappointing U.S. data released Wednesday. Weakness in auto and gasoline sales was expected, he said, but weakness in core sales also weighed on results.
“Declines in furniture and clothing more than offset a big 3.4% increase in electronics sales, which were likely supported by the release of a popular new phone during the month. The weaker figures will likely shave a little from our current 3% GDP (gross domestic product) forecast for Q3 (third quarter), and also suggests weaker-than-expected momentum heading into Q4 (fourth quarter) as well,” he said.
By Debbie Carlson of Kitco News; dcarlson@kitco.com
Follow me on Twitter @dcarlsonkitco
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