Record online sales give short U.S. holiday shopping season a boost: report

[webfact]

Record online sales give short U.S. holiday shopping season a boost: report

 

FILE PHOTO: Shoppers make their way through Fashion Centre at Pentagon City, decorated for the holidays, in Arlington, Virginia, U.S. December 23, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

 

(Reuters) - U.S. shoppers spent more online than in retail stores during the shortest winter shopping season in the past six years, with online sales hitting a record high, a report by Mastercard Inc <MA.N> showed.

 

The holiday shopping season is a crucial period for retailers and can account for up to 40% of annual sales. But this year, Thanksgiving, which traditionally starts the U.S. holiday shopping period, was on Nov. 28, a week later than last year's Nov. 22, leaving retailers with six fewer days to drive sales between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

 

"Due to a later than usual Thanksgiving holiday, we saw retailers offering omnichannel sales earlier in the season, meeting consumers’ demand for the best deals across all channels and devices,” said Steve Sadove, senior adviser for Mastercard.

 

E-commerce sales this year made up 14.6% of total retail and rose 18.8%, according to Mastercard’s data tracking retail sales from Nov. 1 through Christmas Eve.

 

Overall holiday retail sales, excluding auto, rose 3.4%.

 

The last shortened shopping season was in 2013, when retail chains and delivery companies scrambled to get packages to shoppers in time for Christmas.

 

Since then, retailers have invested heavily to provide same-day delivery, lockers for store pick-up and improve their online presence as they battle against retail giant Amazon.com Inc <AMZN.O> for market share.

 

"E-commerce sales hit a record high this year with more people doing their holiday shopping online," Sadove said.

 

Consumers also benefited from a low unemployment rate and rising wages, even as global uncertainty and trade tensions have hit business investment.

 

The data showed sales at department stores fell 1.8% and online sales growth of 6.9%, emphasizing the importance of click-and-collect and online ordering.

 

The apparel category registered stronger-than-expected e-commerce growth, Mastercard’s data showed, with online sales rising 17%.

 

The holiday season was challenging for retailers after Amazon expanded its free return policy to include products that were not previously eligible, giving consumers until January to return even small purchases bought on the website.

 

The National Retail Federation had forecast U.S. holiday retail sales over the two months to increase between 3.8% and 4.2%. That compares with an average annual increase of 3.7% over the past five years.

 

The SpendingPulse report tracks spending by combining sales activity in Mastercard's payments network with estimates of cash and other payment forms but excludes automobile sales.

 

(Reporting by Nivedita Balu; additional reporting by Ismail Shakil in Bengaluru; Editing by Dan Grebler)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2019-12-26

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[zydeco]

Mastercard and the billionaires and bankers thank you. Meanwhile: 

Quote

Total household debt in the United States, including mortgages, auto loans, credit card and student debt, climbed to $13.95 trillion in the third quarter of 2019, eclipsing the debt level at the height of the great recession in Q3 2008 by $1.28 trillion in nominal terms.

 https://www.statista.com/chart/19955/household-debt-balance-in-the-united-states/

Don't forget to MAGA on the way to the poorhouse.

[mogandave]

31 minutes ago, zydeco said:

Mastercard and the billionaires and bankers thank you. Meanwhile: 

Don't forget to MAGA on the way to the poorhouse.

Credit card debt is something  new? 
 

In any event, the stat is (likely intentionally) deceptive as it includes mortgages, and compares to the “height” of the recession. 
 

Many people had already gotten out from under loans they defaulted on, and both home values and home ownership are  way up since that then. 
 

The press turning good new into bad. 

[Boon Mee]

Love ???? this Trump economy! ???? 

[IAMHERE]

Any season is a good enough reason to slam POTUS.

[zydeco]

5 hours ago, mogandave said:

Credit card debt is something  new? 
 

In any event, the stat is (likely intentionally) deceptive as it includes mortgages, and compares to the “height” of the recession. 
 

Many people had already gotten out from under loans they defaulted on, and both home values and home ownership are  way up since that then. 
 

The press turning good new into bad. 

Well, you see, credit card debt is at record levels, too. Along with interest rates that banks charge. I've posted about this before. But here it is again. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/americans-are-holding-record-levels-credit-card-debt-still-planning-n1086826

 

Why anyone would think that the record credit card debt isn't that important because overall consumer debt also includes record mortgage debt is beyond me.

[mogandave]

4 hours ago, zydeco said:

Well, you see, credit card debt is at record levels, too. Along with interest rates that banks charge. I've posted about this before. But here it is again. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/americans-are-holding-record-levels-credit-card-debt-still-planning-n1086826

 

Why anyone would think that the record credit card debt isn't that important because overall consumer debt also includes record mortgage debt is beyond me.

First, I never said, nor do I believe that credit card debt isn’t a problem. Please don’t make things uo and pretend I said them. 
 

I implied they were nothing new, which they are not. So it’s at a record high, what do you think should be done about it? 
 

I think any chump dumb enough to agree to pay 20% on a maxed out credit card is getting what they deserve. 
 

Quit bailing them (banks and companies included) out and that stuff will stop. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cryingdick]

Wow market is about to open and we are having a Christmas melt up with blow out numbers. Quite the recession. If this is what recession is let's have more of it. 

 

If you use Mastercard instead of buy it you are simply on the wrong side of the equation. 

 

 

[Traubert]

America is sinking in a quicksand of both consumer and national debt.

 

Quick! Start another war and steal the contents of someone's treasury to temporarily fend the crisis off. ????????

[Cryingdick]

40 minutes ago, Traubert said:

America is sinking in a quicksand of both consumer and national debt.

 

Quick! Start another war and steal the contents of someone's treasury to temporarily fend the crisis off. ????????

 

It must be sad to live in a world where a nice Christmas season enjoyed by all brings out only gloom and doom. 

[sirineou]

When in the US,I buy most things on line, and mostly on Amazon. Not only because of the convenience of not having to go to the store, but also because of the choice of  products available.

  If I want an electric can opener, if I go to a brick and mortar store, they probably have two or three  for me to chose from, but on Amazon  I can choose from hundreds, read reviews , and ask questions from others who bought the product. 

I am sorry to say , For many things online shopping is the future.

[Cryingdick]

20 minutes ago, sirineou said:

When in the US,I buy most things on line, and mostly on Amazon. Not only because of the convenience of not having to go to the store, but also because of the choice of  products available.

  If I want an electric can opener, if I go to a brick and mortar store, they probably have two or three  for me to chose from, but on Amazon  I can choose from hundreds, read reviews , and ask questions from others who bought the product. 

I am sorry to say , For many things online shopping is the future.

 

It's also great for people living in rural areas. Not just for buying things but for returning defective/unwanted goods. Pain in the ass when you have to drive perhaps an hour or more to buy something and then it doesnt' work and you have to drive again.

 

Saves a lot of gasoline. The down side is the packaging is pretty horrendous. Luckily the USA has vast forests and can make boxes out of tiny trees.

 

 

[zydeco]

14 hours ago, mogandave said:

Quit bailing them (banks and companies included) out and that stuff will stop. 

ZIRP, NIRP, and Not QE QE Repo going on right now. Money being printed and flooding into banks to artificially inflate Trump's conmarket. Joe Mainstreet left holding the bag.

[mogandave]

5 hours ago, zydeco said:

ZIRP, NIRP, and Not QE QE Repo going on right now. Money being printed and flooding into banks to artificially inflate Trump's conmarket. Joe Mainstreet left holding the bag.

So does the market go down each month when Trump transfers all the freshly printed  money to the puppet-master Putin? 
 

[zydeco]

22 minutes ago, mogandave said:

So does the market go down each month when Trump transfers all the freshly printed  money to the puppet-master Putin? 
 

Don't forget the shares he doles out to his other buddies in the aspiring dictators for life club: Xi, Erdogan, and Kim.