US Year-End Shopping Season Sees Sluggish Spending... Impact of Supply Chain and Inflation

November Retail Sales Increase Limited to 0.3%
Significantly Below Market Expectations

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy New York=Correspondent Baek Jong-min] The year-end shopping season sales in the United States fell short of expectations. Rising prices of various products and supply chain disruptions are identified as factors that prevented consumers from opening their wallets widely.

On the 15th (local time), the U.S. Department of Commerce announced that November retail sales increased by 0.3% compared to the previous month. This is significantly below the market expectation of a 0.8% increase. The growth rate sharply slowed compared to October (1.8% increase), raising concerns about a potential consumption slowdown.

Core retail sales, excluding automobiles, gasoline, and groceries, also increased by only 0.3% compared to the previous month. Core retail sales also fell considerably short of the expected growth rate of 0.9%.

Consumption is a key factor accounting for two-thirds of the U.S. real economy.

The Wall Street Journal judged that inflation, supply chain disruptions, and consumers’ early purchasing behavior led to the weak retail sales.

A representative example is the sales at electronics stores, such as TVs, which saw a 4.6% decrease compared to October during the year-end shopping season discount sales.

Andrew Hunter, Chief Economist at Capital Economics, said, "The weak Black Friday sales show that consumption contraction due to product shortages is continuing."

However, November retail sales increased by 18.2% compared to a year ago, proving that household purchasing power remains high. The year-over-year retail sales growth rate for October was 16.26%.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.