The Census Bureau's Advance Retail Sales Report for July released this morning was rather disappointing. Headline sales came in flat month-over-month to one decimal, which conceals a a tiny 0.4% decline at two decimal places. The Investing.com consensus was for 0.4%. Core sales (ex Autos) came in at -0.3% MoM. The Investing.com consensus was for a 0.2% increase.

Here is the introduction from today's report:

The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for July, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $457.7 billion, virtually unchanged (±0.5%)* from the previous month, and 2.3 percent (±0.7%) above July 2015. Total sales for the May 2016 through July 2016 period were up 2.5 percent (±0.5%) from the same period a year ago. The May 2016 to June 2016 percent change was revised from up 0.6 percent (±0.5%) to up 0.8 percent (±0.2%).

Retail trade sales were virtually unchanged (±0.5%)* from June 2016, and up 1.9 percent (±0.5%) from last year. Nonstore retailers were up 14.1 percent (±1.2%) from July 2015, while Health and Personal Care Stores were up 7.8 percent (±2.3%) from last year. [view full report]

The chart below is a log-scale snapshot of retail sales since the early 1990s. The two exponential regressions through the data help us to evaluate the long-term trend of this key economic indicator.

The year-over-year percent change provides another perspective on the historical trend. Here is the headline series.

Here is the year-over-year version of Core Retail Sales.

Retail Sales: "Control" Purchases

The next two charts illustrate retail sales "Control" purchases, which is an even more "Core" view of retail sales. This series excludes Motor Vehicles & Parts, Gasoline, Building Materials as well as Food Services & Drinking Places. The popular financial press typically ignores this series, but it a more consistent and reliable reading of the economy.

Here is the same series year-over-year. Note that the current level is fractionally below the highlighted values at the start of the two recessions since the inception of this series in the early 1990s.

For a better sense of the reduced volatility of the "Control" series, here is a YoY overlay with the headline retail sales.

Bottom Line: The July sales were a major disappointment against the strong numbers in June. Next week we'll take a close look at Real Retail Sales after the July Consumer Price Index is released on Tuesday.