The secular trend of early shopping continues
Christmas shopping starts in October now. A new survey from the US National Retail Federation shows that half of Americans have started shopping already.
There is a secular trend for earlier holiday shopping that I've tracked for years. It boosts Oct/Nov retail sales and dogs the December data. There was a time it caught markets by surprised but I think it's well understood now.
This year will present a particular challenge because shopping appears to have started even earlier amid warnings on supply chain problems. With that, I'd bet on strong October retail sales but caution that it could skew November lower and December particularly low.
Mix in all kinds of other pandemic changes and seasonal adjustment problems and it's a recipe for mixed signals. Expect the same elsewhere.
