Meek Malls

Consumer spending is fine! Retail sales, that is sales at stores, restaurants, and importantly online retailers, rose 0.4% in April, the best gain in three months and sales in March were meaningfully upwardly revised. However, April non-store retail sales (which includes online shopping) jumped 1.4%, while department stores sales rose just 0.2%. Over the past year, non-store sales have risen a whopping 11.9%; department store sales have declined 3.7%.