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Strategies & Market Trends : Zeev's Turnips - No Politics -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: orkrious who wrote (8306)	11/27/2001 9:30:58 AM
From: orkrious	Respond to of 99280

Another useful tidbit from TSCM According to the International Counsel of Shopping Centers, sales for the Thanksgiving weekend were down 1.5% vs. the same period of time last year. This is the first time in seven years there has been an actual decrease in sales. The ICSC survey covers 4,000 specialty retailers in 80 malls. RCT Systems, which counts mall traffic, also reported some big drops. On Saturday, for example, traffic was down 6.8% in malls overall and down 11.6% in department stores. Bear Sterns reports that in New York City same store sales declined nearly 20%. There are also reports of heavy discounting at many department and specialty retailers. It will be interesting to see how consumer confidence numbers look in view of what appears to be some cautious holiday buying.

To: orkrious who wrote (8306)	11/27/2001 10:42:02 AM
From: LTK007	Respond to of 99280

Spend or Save? Shop smart is best advice in mixed-signal economy November 23, 2001 freep.com Among patriotic slogans, "spend, spend, spend" will probably not make the top of history's list. And most U.S. consumers -- the average household already owing more than $8,000 on credit cards -- probably know deep in their guts that their own sense of security relies on a bit of budget discipline. That throws shoppers into an excruciating tension as the holiday buying season marks its traditional start today. But it's a tension based on a false pretense. No one should lurch toward bankruptcy, or even financial anxiety, just to feel as if they're supporting their country. Americans still need to exercise common financial sense. On the "yes, let's spend" side are some amazingly good deals, hot items like Xboxes and GameCubes, nice rates for mortgage refinancing, and cheap gas prices that may free up some extra money. On the "no, let's get the budget under control" side are worries about the economy and layoffs, the uncertainty about terrorism's long-term impacts, and a sense that how much stuff you have counts for a whole lot less these days than rock-deep values such as togetherness. The economy has harsh dislocations that even shoppers can't cure. The airline industry is not going to recover based on what you spend at the mall. The dot-com bubble isn't going to reinflate even if you do all your spending online. You may better improve your peace of mind with home improvement projects, which often require much more in labor -- whether yours or someone else's -- than in store purchases. Though the numbers don't show up on retail balance sheets, you may be of more service to fellow Americans with holiday "spending" at food banks, homeless shelters and other places that help folks already in trouble. Meanwhile, the economic picture shows nothing but roiling transition. Few indicators seem clear-cut. The stock market reached a technical indicator for a new bull market Monday, then went squishy -- but in any event has returned to pre-Sept. 11 levels. October car sales were extraordinary, as automakers pitched 0-percent financing. But some industries continue to shed workers, and seasonal holiday jobs have dried up. Whatever the so-called "new normal" turns out to be, it will arise from millions of individual decisions. It does not depend on the public blindly following a motto like "go back to the stores," as Commerce Secretary Don Evans urged this week. It requires conscious -- and conscientious -- choices about how a post-Sept. 11 America should look. Don't let fear hold you back this holiday season, but don't believe for a minute that a spending frenzy will cure all that's gone awry.>>> end quote--aside> New Yorker magazine had a poilitical cartoon,it was the classic "We Want You" Uncle Sam picture--but it said instead "We Want You to Buy a 10,000 dollar big ticket item!"