Econoday Report: Redbook July 21, 2009

2009 Economic Calendar

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Redbook

Released on 7/21/2009 8:55:00 AM For wk7/18, 2009

	Prior	Actual
Store Sales Y/Y change	-5.7 %	-5.8 %

Highlights
Redbook continues to report extreme rates of deterioration in same-store retail sales: minus 5.8 percent year-on-year in the July 18 week for a minus 1.7 percent plunge from June. The year-on-year rate is a new low but not the month-on-month drop, which is modest compared to the 4.3 percent catastrophe Redbook indicated for June. Redbook hasn't been commenting on why its readings are so extreme though the sweep lower began when Wal-Mart was removed from the sample. In any case, weekly retail reports and nearly all company news out of the sector point to still severe contraction in the retail sector.

Definition
A weekly measure of sales at chain stores, discounters, and department stores. It is a less consistent indicator of retail sales than the weekly ICSC index. It is also calculated differently than other indicators. For instance, figures for the first week of the month are compared with the average for the entire previous month. When two weeks are available, then these are compared with the average for the previous month, and so on. It might be more useful to compare year-over-year figures since these are indeed compared to the comparable week a year ago. This index is correlated with the general merchandise portion of retail sales covering only about 10 percent of total retail sales. Why Investors Care

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Actual Data Source: Haver Analytics | Consensus Data Sources: Market News International & Thomson Financial