Canadian Retail Sales and US Employment

Canadian retail sales increased again in August, growing 0.2 per cent largely on higher sales at food and beverage stores. Overall, gains were reported in 6 of 11 retail sub-sectors. Given today's data release, we expect third quarter Canadian real GDP to record growth of about 2 per cent.

Retail sales in BC were up 0.6 per cent month-over-month, only the fourth monthly increase in retail sales recorded this year. Compared to August 2012, sales were up 2.8 per cent. Year-to-date, BC retail sales are 0.8 per cent higher than in 2012.

In the United States, the end of the government shut-down brings with it some long delayed data including this morning's job report for September. US payrolls expanded by 148,000 jobs while the unemployment rate edged slightly lower to 7.2 per cent. While job growth remains steady, it is somewhat worrying that a once robust trend of 200,000 new jobs in the first quarter of this year has fallen to just 143,000 in the third quarter.

Copyright BCREA – reprinted with permission