The Census Bureau's Advance Retail Sales Report for September was released this morning. Headline sales came in at -0.25% month-over-month to one decimal and was almost at the Investing.com forecast of 0.3%. Core sales (ex Autos) came in at -0.08% MoM (to two decimals).

Here is the introduction from today's report:

Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for September 2019, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $525.6 billion, a decrease of 0.3 percent (±0.5 percent)* from the previous month, but 4.1 percent (±0.7 percent) above September 2018. Total sales for the July 2019 through September 2019 period were up 4.0 percent (±0.5 percent) from the same period a year ago. The July 2019 to August 2019 percent change was revised from up 0.4 percent (±0.5 percent)* to up 0.6 percent (±0.2 percent). [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.

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

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Core Sales

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

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“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.

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

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

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Bottom Line: September sales slowed month over month and were basically at forecasts. When FRED publishes their data, we'll take a closer look at Real Retail Sales.