Retail sales collapse 20.4% in January: CSO

[kerrynorth]

No, there is no need to adjust your set. This is a deep depression figure and not a recession.
http://www.cso.ie/releasespublicatio...urrent/rsi.pdf

[Digout]

Jaysus, thank the lord we are getting a soft landing.

[Factorem]

Jaysus, thank the lord we are getting a soft landing.

As usual, treat the whole thing as one big joke.

FF would be proud.

[Digout]

As usual, treat the whole thing as one big joke.

FF would be proud.

it is a big joke.

[smitchy2]

So value of sales is back down to 2004 levels.
Volumes of sales are back to the base case year 2000. Ouch.

Hardly that surprising after the tax receipts.

On the EU list (up to Dec) we seem to be down with the worst- looks like Latvia and Estonia fared the worse up till that date.
Say we will be joining their levels of spending declines shortly.

[Middleaged]

Well I'm not surprised, 3 clothes shops where I am have already shut since Janurary.

The budget is going to add to this by taking more out of the economy.

[mccafferty cat]

Incredible.

But it does go some way towards explaining the catastrophic tax returns for Jan and Feb

[seabhac siulach]

These figures are bad...however, if motor trade figures are excluded, they show no monthly change compared to December (as the CSO report states). Are we, therefore, seeing some signs of a leveling out? While the motor trade sector (one-off luxury purchases, essentially) is in real trouble, can the same be said for the rest of the retail sector based on these figures? A 6.3% year-on-year decrease is bad, but surely not catastrophic considering the large increase in unemployment, etc. (by amounts way about 6.3%).

[kerrynorth]

Incredible.

But it does go some way towards explaining the catastrophic tax returns for Jan and Feb

Not really. Jan/Feb VAT returns do not come into exchequer until from March onwards.

[Duth Ealla]

[FONT=Switzerland-Bold]Retail Sales volume decreases by 20.4% Year on Year though.[/FONT]

[FONT=TimesNewRoman][SIZE=2]The volume of retail sales (i.e. excluding price effects) decreased by 20.4% in[/SIZE][/FONT]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]January 2009 compared to January 2008. There was a monthly decrease of 9.4%.[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]The large year on year retail sales decrease in January 2009 is primarily due to the[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]large decrease in the motor trades sector. In January 2009 motor trades decreased[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]42.2% on the same period last year. Usually in January Motor Trades account for[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]over one third of retail sales.[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]If Motor Trades are excluded the volume of retail sales decreased by 8.1% in[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]January 2009 compared to January 2008 and the monthly change was -0.1%.[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]The value of retail sales decreased by 19.9% in January 2009 compared to[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]January 2008 and decreased by 10.0% in the month. However, if Motor Trades[/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]are excluded, the annual decrease was 6.3% and there was no monthly [/FONT][/SIZE]
[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]change. [/FONT][/SIZE]

[SIZE=2][FONT=TimesNewRoman]Excluding motor sales there was no monthly change. So are we at the bottom of the retail dip? [/FONT][/SIZE]