US retail sales fall unexpectedly on lower auto numbers
US retail sales have dropped by 0.1 per cent in September, despite consensus analyst estimates suggesting that sales would grow by 0.1 per cent in that month.
Excluding automobiles sales rose by 0.4 per cent, as forecast by economists. In August total sales rose by 0.2 per cent according to the US Census Bureau data.
Paul Dales, senior US economist at Capital Economics, says that the deal reveals a decent underlying rise – saying that we already knew from the unit sales data that auto sales declined last month.
Dales thinks that the news from this release is the "is the 0.5 per cent month-on-month rise in sales excluding autos, gasoline and building materials, which was a little stronger than we expected."