US Retail Sales Unexpectedly Rise in September

US retail sales unexpectedly rose in September, but there are concerns that supply restrictions could negatively affect the holiday shopping season amid persistent shortages of cars and other goods.

Retail Sales in the US rose by 0.7% on a monthly basis to $625.4 billion in September, the data published by the US Census Bureau revealed on Friday. This reading followed August’s increase of 0.9% (revised from 0.7%) and came in much better than the market expectation for a decline of 0.2%.

That Retail Sales Excluding Autos were up 0.8% in the same period, compared to the market expectation of 0.5%.

Economists polled by Reuters had expected retail sales to fall 0.2%.

The continuing global shortage of chips has prompted car companies to cut production, boosting prices and limiting the choices available to buyers.

There is also a shortage of other goods amid the accumulation of goods in the ports due to the lack of workers.