– Retail Sales Crumble, Suffer Worst Run Since Lehman (ZeroHedge, March 12, 2015):
Earlier today we warned readers that based on actual credit card spending data, today’s retail sales data would continue the worst trend since Lehman, and sure enough that’s what happened: moments ago the Commerce department reported that in February, retail sales missed once again and missed big and across the board, the third big miss in a row, with the headline print coming at -0.6%, far below the 0.3% expected, and in line with the -0.8% drop last month. Putting the headline numbers in context: December -0.9%, January -0.8%, February -0.6%. Excluding the volatile autos and gas, sales dropped once again, sliding -0.2%, below the 0.3% expected – in fact below the lowest estimate – and worse even than last month’s downward revised -0.1% decline. And with that the worst run in retail sales since Lehman is now in the record books.
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