(11-29-2022 03:27 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  

(11-27-2022 07:17 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(11-27-2022 05:05 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  Inflation and online shopping...This should not be a surprise. I think my wife bought every gift this year already on line. She starts Christmas shopping around Labor day. The FedEx and UPS trucks pretty much drop off something daily.

Nope. If internet sales were booming Amazon would not be laying off workers. This is not surprising nor should this even be news. The consumer is tapped out. The last line of defense was credit cards and those balances have now risen to record highs---and the rates have risen--meaning the monthly credit card payments have increased higher than expected. The consumer is now running out of sources of disposable funds to tap (I suspect we are about to see home refi applications start rising despite interest rates not being very advantageous). Keep in mind---over 60% of people reported that they are now living paycheck to paycheck. Cant cut fuel purchases---you need gas to get to work. Cant cut food. Still gunna heat the house this winter. Cant cut the credit card payments and cant get the limit raised. Cant cut any of those essential bills---but you can spend less for Christmas this year---and thats whats going to happen.

I'm not so sure. I saw this AM where Cyber Monday did set a new record...something like 11 Billion in sales. Could be a ton on credit however. Also a good bit of this get returned..so the figure is preliminary.
I thought the Amazon cuts had a lot to do with them having to beef up during Covid and now not needing that extra staff now. Anyway...for sure the brick and mortar stores are hurting. I talked to a manager at WM on last Saturday and she said Black Friday was down about 1/3 from previous years. Something is going on.

It was up 2.2 percent year over year. Given that we have an inflation rate of 8% (or higher)—-that means we have a real world inflation adjusted DECLINE in sales of around 6% (despite the more aggressive discounting).