April 2015 UK retail sales data report 21 May 2015

  • Prior -0.5%. Revised to -0.7%
  • 4.7% vs 3.8% exp y/y. Prior 4.2%. Revised to 4.0%
  • Ex-fuel 1.2% vs 0.3% exp m/m. Prior 0.2%. Revised to 0.0%
  • 4.7% vs 3.7% exp y/y. Prior 5.0%. Revised to 4.8%
  • 3m/3m 0.7% vs 0.9% prior

Warmer weather helps retail sales by driving clothing sales say the ONS

GBPUSD bolts up to 1.5644 from 1.5590

The rise in clothing is being tipped as a one off. It was the biggest jump in four years. That might be true but there's decent gains in some of the other categories too. Fuel picked up from a 6.2% drop last month and other stores were up 2.8% vs -1.9% prior

These are good numbers but retails sales can be volatile at the best of times. The trend is clear though that the UK consumer is still spending and that's good news however you look at it. We'll keep one eye on the credit card levels though ;-)

UK retail sales y/y