Sales during the day after Thanksgiving rose 3 percent
… to $10.6 billion, according to preliminary figures released Saturday by ShopperTrak RCT Corp., a Chicago-based research firm that tracks sales at more than 50,000 retail outlets. Last year, shoppers spent about $10.3 billion on the day after Thanksgiving, dubbed Black Friday because it was historically the sales-packed day when retailers would become profitable for the year.
But this year, many observers were expecting consumers to spend more time browsing than buying, amid contractions in consumer spending and growing fears about economic uncertainty and trouble in the global financial markets.
“Under these circumstances, it’s truly amazing when you think about all the news that led into the holiday season, it certainly appears that consumers are willing to spend more than most expected,” said ShopperTrak co-founder Bill Martin. “Everybody wants value for their dollar, so we saw a tremendous response to the discounts.”
Are Americans finally becoming immunized to the perpetual alarmism of our “state of fear” media? If waning public interest in “global warming” hysteria is any indication, the answer may be yes.
Barack will just pay for Christmas when he fill the gas tanks and pays the mortgage.
“One of the weirdest, most perceptually jarring things about the economic “crisis” is that everything looks the same. We are told every day and in every news venue that we are in Great Depression II, that we are in a crisis, a cataclysm, a meltdown, the credit crunch from hell, that we will lose millions of jobs, and that the great abundance is over and may never return. Three great investment banks have fallen while a fourth totters, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average has fallen 31% in six months. And yet when you free yourself from media and go outside for a walk, everything looks . . . the same.
Everyone is dressed the same. Everyone looks as comfortable as they did three years ago, at the height of prosperity. The mall is still there, and people are still walking into the stores and daydreaming with half-full carts in aisle 3. Everyone’s still overweight. Nothing looks different.
In the Depression people sold apples on the street. They sold pencils. Angels with dirty faces wore coats too thin and short and shivered in line at the government surplus warehouse. There was the Dust Bowl, and the want of the cities. Captains of industry are said to have jumped from the skyscrapers of Wall Street. People didn’t have enough food.
They looked like a catastrophe was happening. We do not. It’s as if the news is full of floods but we haven’t seen it rain.
Anyway it is odd, surreal, to have the steady downbeat of Great Depression II all over the news, and few signs of GDII on the street, odd that the news we’re hearing is at odds with what our eyes are seeing, at least at the moment.
~Peggy Noonan in the WSJ
MP: Michigan has been in a “single-state recession” for years, and yet almost every time I go out to a restaurant, it’s completely crowded, often with lines waiting to get in?? Yes, everything looks the same, even in Michigan. Even in Flint, Michigan.”
http://mjperry.blogspot.com/
OT:
Excuse my Yankee ignorance, but what happens if the Bloc Quebecois bloke wins the election? Does he immediately resign, or does he merely demand a recount?
I’m scratching my head over this one.
It’s always in the interest of the loony left to shout ‘the sky is falling.’
A tactic as old as the hills.
Create a problem then present yourself as the only one who can solve it.
If the stock market keeps going up for another week the way it has for the last six days, then the US economy should be past the worst of it.
The American consumer has saved true democracy again, that is the land of the free and the home of the brave., the noble experiment that the individual is the master of his fate … not some marxist bureaucrat or some MSM doomsayer.
Better times are ahead. This cycle is nothing new and there will be no Great Depression II. That’s just what the Chicken Littles wish for, so they can continue to tell you how to run your life.
There’s only one control that matters … self-control. I’m seeing more and more evidence that’s what the loony left lacks.
Like the so-called ‘global warming crisis’, the ‘financial crisis’ is confined to a few specific areas of the economy. Large corporations are having difficulty getting financing for big dollar projects (auto company retooling) because the banks don’t trust the management of these firms, nor their partners in any such investment deal. That’s a lack of confidence in the directors of these companies brought on by years of mismanagement. At the other end of the scale, consumer credit is still alive and well. Here in Alberta you are better off taking a bus or taxi to the malls because you sure can’t get a parking spot unless you camp out overnight. The shops are jammed and people are buying.
In the States it is slightly different, but that’s a result of the imploded housing and mortgage market. However, the sharpies are getting around it. I have a friend in Florida who has two houses mortgaged to the hilt that he no longer rents because the people who couldn’t afford their mortgages can’t sfford to rent either. He has transferred all his assets to Canadian banks. He has enough cash to pay the mortgages off in full, but he is awaiting the next infusion of stimulus cash to hit the people in danger of defaulting. When it arrives, he intends to pocket the funds and then walk away from the mortgages. He reasons that the banks won’t care because their bad loans have been picked up by the taxpayer. Once he is certain the banks won’t be coming after him, he will pull his assets back Stateside and buy up a couple of houses at bargain prices with a down payment the banks will jump at. He can then rent them out at a rate that is affordable while he waits for the housing market to rebound. It’s a scam and he intends to work it to the hilt.
Meanwhile the taxpayer finances his asset growth scheme simply because the U.S. government is throwing money around like there is no tomorrow. And now the Liberals, NDP, and BQ want to do the same.
Well, things may not be as rosy as they appear due to the continued ability and habitual ease with which Americans tap their credit line. The average savings rate in the US is negative one (ish) percent. Not good. Can’t be sustained.
Kate: Something I’ve wondered about while reading the various instalments of this thread: how come you don’t buy stocks or equity mutual funds as recommended by your bank? This would seem to be the logical action of one who so often cites — often correctly — the excessive pessimism of the punditocracy. As the late Sir John Templeton used to say, “Buy at the time of maximum pessimism”.
The foregoing is based on a comment of yours a while back in which you expressed a strong negative reaction to a suggestion from a bank employee that you set up a monthly investment plan. Perhaps I misread you or am imagining things? (as I seem wont to do lately).
I was going to point out that gross revenues were down 20% in my store this month, then I remembered that I was out of commission for nearly two weeks because of surgery. When you take that into account my November numbers actually went UP. 🙂
Oprah had Al Gore on whipping up a fear frenzy over CO2 levels. His only evidence: photos of retreating glaciers and then a chart showing CO2 at record levels. There was not one scrap of logic connecting the two.
Me No Dhimmi: Kate never said she doesn’t invest in the stock market or mutual funds. She said she wasn’t interested in the high risk, manufactured securities that have since become worthless.
Watch how fast this “recession” disappears on the front pages once Obama sits in the White House.
Higher sales due in large part to bigger discounts – supply and demand working its majic.
However, there is no doubt that profits will be lower and some retailers are headed to chapter 11 (some are already there) – Survival of the fittest working its majic.
The Conservatives came out with a very conservative fiscal plan – under the circumstances of how the above two phenomenon seem to be working without causing huge social upheaval so far, that would seem to be the correct course – under the circumstances we have seen thusfar. If circumstances change so too should the reaction by the government, but not until then.
Meanwhile, vested interests try and bailout the weaker players – GM, Ford, Chrysler and the Canadian opposition parties…thus prolonging the agony, punishing the winners and not teaching lessons to lesser players and forcing them to change the way they do things.
Seven Year American Depression Watch Remains On High Alert….I love irony!!! Hey Yukon Gold…can’t see sarcasm?
“The foregoing is based on a comment of yours a while back in which you expressed a strong negative reaction to a suggestion from a bank employee that you set up a monthly investment plan.”
The comment was in response to an offer at a “higher risk, higher return” proposal.
Kate: Well, without knowing the specific security recommendation …
But of course, these aren’t our grandfather’s banks eh? Met a woman in Vancouver recently who made $1 million on a real estate transaction and lost $1 million on a $1 million “bond” sold by her bank. Have a friend who just got an inheritance inluding one BMO security with FMV of $750 with a book of $25,000. You gotta wonder about “Know Your Client” compliance at the banks. But of course they’re not just “too big to fail” they’re also too big to comply.
We are actually in ‘bad’ times but that’s all relative. Here in Ontario there is hardly a day without some plant closing and a few hundred stiffs losing their jobs. For THEM it is a depression.
But the fact remains the bulk of people still have jobs, and still go shopping. The same is true in the USA.
Much of the wealth that evaporated in the stock and real estate markets was paper wealth anyway. Those who leveraged their home equity to blow away on luxury items have only themselves to blame. Again, most people were smarter. They may be poorer on paper, but not in reality.
Here on my lake one cottage last year sold for 500,000$. Not bad for a little frame house with 125 feet of waterfront 3 hours from Toronto.
This year another neighbour was forced to sell (lost job) a similar property and listed at 500K too. No takers. Dropped to 400K. No takers. Finally sold last month for 340K$. On paper he lost 160K, but what I see is that even in that troubled time someone had 340K to put on a vacation property. Not exactly the 1930s yet.
Personally, I’m not going to look at Black-Friday sales as a great indicator of whether consumer spending is going to be higher or lower this year …
Without a lot of information it is difficult to say whether people are expecting to do a lot more shopping in the weeks ahead, or whether people decided to take advantage of the Black-Friday sales to buy the majority of their gifts. Personally, if I had a lot of people to shop for (I don’t because my family does a name-exchange between the adults) I would be fairly likely to go into a book store and buy a cheap paper-back or two (or to buy a box of cheap chocolate) rather than spend the money on something fancier; and my shopping could (probably) be done in a couple of hours on Black Friday.
When parents are searching around for a Wii/XBox/PS3 or an iPod for their children, some clothing or jewlery for eachother, and a bunch of little “Gadgets” for their friends and family it will probably take a lot more than a couple of hours at a couple of stores to complete their shopping.
Couple of observations. I don’t think the “Big 3” are going bankrupt. They are just trying to get out of operating in North America to get away from the unsustainable costs of UAW/CAW workers. They all have extensive operations in China and both GM and Ford recently opened brand new plants in Russia. Ford just opened a brand new facility in Brazil.
Stock market: I am doing well in relatively short term positions in gold mining companies. The price of gold has gone up 100$ in the last month and the price of Barrick, Goldcorp, Agnico have gone upas would be expected. I am kicking myself for not buying ADM-NY, when all my instincts told me I should. For no reason at all their share price had dropped from about 50 to about 20 over the course of a year. At the height of the panic they could be had for 13, with par Canadian dollars. Now they are 27 with an 80 cent dollar. This is a company that is one of the biggest primary producers of food in the world, they have not missed a dividend payment in 75 years and they were down to e P/E ratio of about 2. Whats not to love, except not having the guts to go for it. Who dares still wins.
I bought bank stocks after they tanked due to the whole ABCP problems, I figure they had bottomed out and it was a good time to buy. Since then I have lost 20% of my capital (if I sell), but the dividend payments are still more than twice the rate of return that I am payed in my savings account, and dividends are taxed at a lower rate. BMO just announced their year end earnings, and despite writedowns they still made more in this fourth quarter than the year before. If you buy them now, you will get an 8 percent dividend.
The company I work for is worried that they are going to need thousands of skilled trades people to replace retirees in the next while. I am very well payed and have another 22 years of work ahead of me. Lots of people here are going to hurt, but I hopefully will not be one of them.
How about those shipping rate collapses? And the price collapse of homes? And the auto industry being trashed? And the trillion-dollar bailouts.
Yup, everything’s just tickety-boo.
I believe the Canajun economy is projected to retract about 2% . If you happen to have a job in an affected sector it will look bad. If you happen to live in Alberta where there is a worker shortage (still) you will not notice anything but the continuous outcry from the media.
Free the West. you have nothing to lose but your taxburden.
We’ve had our best November for years. Very odd. But our customer base isn’t the idiots. The firms that service idiots will suffer.
I’m in BC interior, and are seeing the first wave of young fellows showing up back home. If you could stand up you could get paid well in Calgary. Now you have to be able to work and produce. Those who can’t are coming home to momma.
Derek
Sorry to spread the bad news, but there’s a recession on, and it’s going to get worse, perhaps much worse, despite a late twitch of consumer silliness on “Black Friday”.
The US is a great country, but it’s hardly immune to bad economic times.
The debt and misinvestments in consumerism and service industries, rather than savings and productivity, are real and Barack Obama is going to make it worse.
It’s not the liberals particularly who have been the jeremiahs here – plenty of conservatives have been on it about what was coming for a while now. In fact, it’s mainly the lefties that pretend that everything is pretty good in the brave new world they have made and now govern – at least nothing is so wrong that more government money won’t fix it.
the world liberals have made will be an economic, demographic and cultural disaster, and I’m afraid it may be starting sooner than we think.
to the doom-sayers
I hope for a huge shake-down with this economic down turn
maybe the unions and the overpaid and underworked union fools with get a dose of reality
if the three big fail, I’m certain that some well heeled and enterprizing individuals will buy some of the assets and the money making “lines” (products) and start new companies with out the $35/hr widget wonkers and the union whores
First of all, since I’m a ‘the glass is half full’ type of guy (because I always pick the best bartender), I am extremely happy that retail sales are up in the US.
To me, it means that people have decided that Christmas is a big deal this year, and they are buying lots of presents for their family and their loved ones.
Secondly, it doesn’t mean that the USA economic problems are over.
Because it doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out that if there are close to 320 acres of brand new $40,000 plus automobiles sitting on the docks in San Diego because people aren’t buying them, then the potential buyers have that much more munney to spend on the things that are important in their lives, ie their family.
Oh Lord won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz, because San Diego got lots of them and they’re getting cheaper by the day.
Go Santa go.
cal2…if you know of any QUALIFIED,and know their shit,CNC programmers,send them my way,PLEASE.And a couple of MANUAL machinists would be nice too!!!
I guess all those who have nothing to save are out spending the worthless fiat currency the Fed keeps printing.
“Spend your paycheck on Friday because by Monday it will buy nothing” – (and old German saying from their monetary inflation era)