Retail Sales post broad advance in September
|Summary
Despite worries about the financial health of the consumer and potential weakening in the labor market, U.S. retailers had a solid month in September. Control group sales rose more than twice the expected amount, pointing to stronger Q3 consumer spending.
Broad-based strength in a better-than-expected report
If you were looking for a sign that consumer spending was slipping, today's retail sales report for September was not it. The headline increase of 0.4% for September was just a bit ahead of the 0.3% increase that had been expected, but the real upside was in the core measures of spending. Excluding sales at auto dealers and gas stations, retailers notched a solid 0.7% increase which was more than double the 0.3% gain that had been expected. These gains came despite the fact that August's sales numbers were revised higher. Control group sales, which tends to line up with personal consumption spending in the GDP report, also came in much stronger than expected with 0.7% gain. That is the biggest gain in three months and the third largest monthly gain of 2024.
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