by Calculated Risk on 1/14/2014 08:39:00 AM

On a monthly basis, retail sales increased 0.2% from November to December (seasonally adjusted), and sales were up 4.7% from December 2012. Sales in November were revised down from a 0.7% increase to 0.4%. From the Census Bureau report:

The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for December, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $431.9 billion, an increase of 0.2 percent from the previous month, and 4.1 percent (±0.7%) above December 2012. ... The October to November 2013 percent change was revised from +0.7 percent to +0.4 percent.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows retail sales since 1992. This is monthly retail sales and food service, seasonally adjusted (total and ex-gasoline).


Retail sales ex-autos increased 0.7%. 

The second graph shows the year-over-year change in retail sales and food service (ex-gasoline) since 1993.

Retail sales ex-gasoline increased by 4.6% on a YoY basis (4.1% for all retail sales).

The increase in December was above consensus expectations, but was close including the downward revision to November.