U.S. retailers, led by luxury goods
sellers such as Saks Inc. and Neiman Marcus Group Inc. probably
posted their biggest holiday season sales gains in at least four
years, bolstered by after-Christmas discounts on clothing,
jewelry and decorations.
Sales at U.S. stores open at least a year rose about 4
percent in November and December from the year-earlier period,
said Michael Niemira, economist for the International Council of
Shopping Centers, who tracks the results of about 80 merchants.
That’s the largest gain since a 5.4 percent increase in 1999.
Retailers needed the sales boost during Christmas week and
the past weekend to make up for a holiday season marred by
snowstorms and a tendency among more shoppers to delay purchases
until the last minute. The late surge will also help most
merchants avoid even deeper profit-eroding price cuts on leftover
goods to make room for seasonal merchandise.
“This has been a very good holiday season,” said Don
Gimbel, who helps manage $1.8 billion at Carret & Co. in New York
including Target Corp. shares. “It all points to pretty good
things.”
Luxury goods retailers such as Neiman Marcus posted the
biggest gains because their customers have benefited from rising
stock prices and are less concerned about unemployment, money
managers such as Gimbel said. A sluggish holiday season would
have raised concern that consumer spending, a mainstay of the
U.S. economic recovery, was losing steam.
Total sales made using MasterCard credit cards rose 10.5
percent from Thanksgiving to Christmas, according to MasterCard
International Inc. An extra day in the shopping season compared
with the year-earlier period helped to boost results. Visa USA
said total spending on its debit and credit cards increased 14.2
percent over the same period in 2002.
Bloomberg News
