00:00Retail sales coming in at about what was forecast, the advanced headline number, up half a percent.
00:07We're still waiting for the other things to drop, so I'll point out that initial jobless claims,
00:13basically at 211. That's up from 199, a revised figure from last week.
00:20Continuing claims, 1,782,000. That's up from 1,758,000.
00:27So no real change going on in the labor market there.
00:30And as we wait for the retail sales figures to slowly come out, import prices up 1.9 percent,
00:38a big jump there from nine-tenths last month, but ex-petroleum up only seven-tenths.
00:43That's still a strong number, may affect the PCE inflation index, but a lot of that is gas.
00:49Okay, we've got some more numbers now for the retail sales.
00:52Ex-auto up seven-tenths of a percent, and ex-auto and gas up five-tenths of a percent.
01:00The same story for retail sales control. That's the one we really care about.
01:04It was up eight-tenths, a revised eight-tenths, which is a tenth stronger than last month,
01:08but it drops in the month of April to five-tenths.
01:13Mike, you've had a second look at the numbers. What do you see?
01:15Well, it is, as we anticipated, a gasoline story. Sales at gas stations up 2.8 percent.
01:21Remember, retail sales calculated on a dollar volume basis.
01:24If you take gasoline out of the headline number, the headline would be a three-tenths gain instead of a
01:30five-tenths gain.
01:31We do see some declines here. Auto sales and parts down four-tenths of a percent.
01:37Furniture and home furnishing stores down two percent.
01:41Clothing stores down one-and-a-half percent. And department stores down three-point-two percent.
01:47Now, much of that department store money probably went into the Internet shopping craze.
01:51Non-store retailers up by one-point-one percent.
01:54And perhaps one of the things that we really want to look at here is that food services and drinking
02:00places,
02:00which we always note is a very discretionary item, were up a strong six-tenths percent.
02:06So there are still people out there spending. Some of the categories have changed.
02:11But, for example, food stores still up eight-tenths of a percent. Groceries up seven-tenths of a percent.
02:17Some of that is going to be inflation.
02:19But people have not completely backed off yet, even though some categories are down.
02:23So there are still people out there.
Comments