Friday, July 30th, 2010

Economic Indicators: ICSC-Goldman Weekly Chain-Store Sales Snapshot

November 3rd, 2009 at 9:40 am by CB | No Comments

The International Council of Shopping Centers (“ICSC”)-Goldman Weekly Chain-Store Sales Snapshot (“Snapshot”) is released every week on Tuesday at 7:45 am, while every month a more comprehensive set of statistics are released reflecting the sales figures of the prior month. The statistical analysis represented in the Snapshot covers sales figures during the prior week from Sunday to Saturday. The Snapshot is compiled by the ICSC and Goldman Sachs and no revisions are provided, however, the monthly releases, which are only conducted by the ICSC, are revised as more data becomes available.

The ICSC-Goldman Snapshot is an index that measures both weekly and monthly nominal comparable-store sales for chain stores. Since the index measures comparable-store sales, the chain stores used for data collection must be operational for at least one year. The Snapshot represents the general merchandise component of retail sales, which accounts for nearly 10% of total retail sales and does not include gas or auto purchases, and primarily follows large national chains. At present, the Snapshot collects its data from a representative sample of approximately 40 major retail-chain stores. This sample data is then used to extrapolate weekly industry sales. The index construction utilizes sales-weighted geometric average growth rates to maintain historical consistency and is statistically benchmarked to board-based monthly retail industry sales aggregate. Moreover, the data in the Snapshot is seasonally adjusted on both a weekly and yearly basis. Nevertheless, the year-on-year comparisons are more reliable than the weekly comparisons.

The press release also includes mention of weather conditions from the prior week. These weather conditions are at times used to explain part of the weekly changes in the Snapshot’s index.

This economic indicator’s strength is its immediacy as it helps provide a very general sense of consumer attitudes. The more comprehensive monthly data is much more reliable and is more heavily valued by investors and traders. Nevertheless, investors and traders pay attention to the Snapshot because it can help signal growth and excessive growth, which may lead to inflation.