November Retail Sales Terrible But Retail Stocks Higher
As expected, November retail sales were just terrible. Here are same store sales* for some retailers:
Kohl’s: -17.5%
Macy’s: -13.3%
JC Penney: -11.9%
Neiman Marcus: -11.9%
Target: -10.4%
Gap: -10.0%
Saks: -5.2%
Costco U.S.: -2.0%
Walmart U.S.: +3.0%
* Last year there was an extra week of post-Thanksgiving shopping that fell in November whereas this year it will be in December therefore pushing down November’s sales and pushing up December’s. Therefore, the most accurate comparisons will come from comparing November and December with last year. Nevertheless, it’s pretty clear that retail sales are getting crushed.
Interestingly, all of these stocks are up a good amount this morning possibly suggesting that all this bad news is already in the stocks.
Disclosure: Top Gun is long shares of Walmart (WMT) and Costco (COST) and has no position in any of the other companies mentioned.