After a deep dip in November and December, demand for jewelry and other retail goods has indicated signs of stabilizing in the U.S. market. There is a decline in the retail sales for first two months of 2009, the decline is much more neutral than the rate of decrease which is observed at the end of 2008.
In all retail categories, there is less autos and food, and specialty jewelers’ sales for the first two months of 2009. They are operating approximately 90 percent more or less same like the previous year’s levels for the same two-month period. In short, it will not be the end of the world for consumer expenses (even though the mass media would made people to believe that the end is near). Shoppers are still spending, but their rate of spending is reduced by nearly 10 percent or so on a yearly basis. Specialty jewelers’ sales in the U.S. market in February month were $2.3 billion, there is a decline of over 11 percent.
Overall U.S. consumer expenditure on jewelry in February was operating at an annual rate of $64.5 billion (preliminary figures), decline of 1 percent from the previous year. Clearly, this very moderate decline is in remarkable contrast to retail sales trends (which had decline of nearly 10 percent), but it is estimated that the number will be corrected downward later. The Department of Commerce has been creating important corrections to this data created before, and further revisions are also expected.
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