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Economy in Brief
U.S. Initial Unemployment Insurance Claims Rise Just 9,000
Initial claims for unemployment insurance rose modestly by 9,000 to 745,000 in the week ended February 27...
U.S. Productivity's Decline Lessened in Q4'20; Reverses Q3 Increase
Revisions to nonfarm business sector productivity indicated a 4.2% decline during Q4'20...
EMU Unemployment Rate Steadies in January
The overall EMU unemployment rate was steady in January, off peak, but still elevated...
U.S. ADP Nonfarm Private Payroll Increase Disappoints in February
Job market strength moderated last month....
U.S. ISM Services Index Weakens in February
The ISM Composite Index of Services Activity declined to 55.3 during February...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Tom Moeller July 26, 2005
Chain store sales increased 0.4% last week according to the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)-UBS survey. This fourth consecutive gain lifted sales so far in July 0.5% higher than during June when sales fell 0.4% versus May.
During the last ten years there has been a 56% correlation between the y/y change in chain store sales and the change in non-auto retail sales less gasoline, as published by the US Census Department. Chain store sales correspond directly with roughly 14% of non-auto retail sales less gasoline.
The leading indicator of chain store sales from ICSC recovered a piece of the prior week's sharp decline with a 0.3% w/w (0.3% y/y) rise.
The ICSC-UBS retail chain-store sales index is constructed using the same-store sales (stores open for one year) reported by 78 stores of seven retailers: Dayton Hudson, Federated, Kmart, May, J.C. Penney, Sears and Wal-Mart.
ICSC-UBS (SA, 1977=100) | 07/23/05 | 07/16/05 | Y/Y | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Total Weekly Chain Store Sales | 458.5 | 456.9 | 4.2% | 4.6% | 2.9% | 3.6% |