Auto Sales Drop Erases 1.2% Retail Jump

Leaving out sales figures for automobiles, U.S. retail sales jumped 1.2%, the largest increase in nearly two years, a government report released Wednesday said.

An increase in retail sales suggests that demand for trucking services is increasing.

Overall U.S. retail sales fell 0.2% in January to $295.7 billion, after a revised 0.2% increase in December. Excluding automobile sales, that figure rose 0.7%.

The 1.2-% increase in retail sales excluding automobile sales took sales receipts to $223 billion for the first month of the year. Often automobile sales are left out of retail sales figures because their high cost skews the numbers.

The rise in sales, excluding automobiles, was the largest since March 2000 when the figure rose 2%.

Analysts had expected the 0.2% overall drop in January, but the 1.2% figure, excluding autos, was much better than the anticipated 0.4% increase, Bloomberg reported.

8491