The Day at a Glance | April 20 2023

*Retail sales in Mexico surprised to the downside in February and logged a slight setback. 

*The Eurozone´s trade balance logged a surplus (4.6 billion euros) for the first time since September 2021. 

*In the US, new unemployment claims logged a 245 thousand increase in the week ending April 15th. With this, the 4-week average remained at 240 thousand, still close to its 15-month high level of 242 thousand claims recorded on March 24th of this year. 

*The Philadelphia FED´s index on manufacturing businesses´ outlook fell to its lowest level since May of 2020. It logged a -31.3 point reading in April and was mainly dragged down by the new orders (-22.7) and delivery time (-25.0) components. 

Economic environment

Retail sales decreased -0.3% m/m in February. However, this reading was partially explained by a strong base comparison given the fact that January logged a 1.6% monthly figure, which led the consensus to expect a 0.5% monthly figure. With this, at an annual rate, retail sales logged a 3.4% figure, below January´s 5.3%. In a disaggregate manner, the sale of stationary items and leisure increased 11.1% annual, followed by online sales, which increased 8.7% y/y; this was partially offset by -4.5% and -4.0% annual setbacks in groceries, food, beverages and tobacco, and hardware sales, respectively. Even though retail sales have logged a descending trend since the start of 2022, the 14-month average (3.95%) is still above the pre-pandemic average (2015-2019; 2.77%), which implies that retail sales have continued being resilient.