Wednesday: Retail Sales

From the WSJ: Don’t Expect Cheap Gasoline to Fuel Retail Sales

The slump in crude oil had, as of February, led to pump-price savings estimated at over $100 billion annually for American households. But tepid retail-sales data from December through February left forecasters scratching their heads about consumers’ failure to spend much of it.

Back in November, year-over-year growth in retail sales was running at 4.7%. It had slipped to 1.26% by March. Even stripping out gas-station sales, it had slowed to 4% from 5.8% over the same period.

There are two likely explanations: the weather and the fact spending is sticky.

Wednesday:
• At 7:00 AM ET, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

• At 8:30 AM, the Retail sales for April will be released. The consensus is for retail sales to increase 0.2% in April, and to increase 0.5% ex-autos.

• At 10:00 AM, Manufacturing and Trade: Inventories and Sales (business inventories) report for March. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in inventories.