Better income and low inflation foster increase in trade sales
March 13, 2018 09h00 AM | Last Updated: March 13, 2018 02h20 PM
The volume of retail trade increased 3.2% in January in the same month, the tenth positive result in this type of comparison. Against December 2017, there was smaller increase, of 0.9%, after the decrease recorded in the previous month. That is what shows the Monthly Survey of Trade, released today by the IBGE.
Trade remained on an upward trend, but January lost a little of its strength in the comparison with results of the last quarter and of the second semester of 2017. So, retail sales figures in January 2017 were higher than in January 2018, “once trade had been recovering since the end of 2016 and remained so throughout 2017”, says Isabella Nunes, manager of the survey.
Versus the result of January 2017, six of the eight subsectors of retail trade recorded increase. That of hyper and supermarkets, which also encompasses food products, beverages and tobacco, accounted for the biggest impact on the indicator, with an increase of 3.1%. According to Isabella, the result is a consequence of the improvement in the income of the population and of the low inflation: “the increase of the real income and the systematic reduction of prises of food at home were the main factors accounting for the positive performance of the sector”.
According to Isabella, another segment fostered by the improve of income was that of other articles of personal and domestic use, which increased by 10.5%, and encompasses department stores, jewelry shops, sporting goods stores and toy stores. With this result, the sector has remained on a trend of recovery since September 2016, and “can be also be associated to the reduction of the interest rate and a bigger avaiability of credit for natural persons”, says the manager of the survey.
Also in comparison with January 2017, the sector of fuels and lubricants recorded a decrease of 4.0%. According to Isabella, that happened because fuel prices are above the average change. Decrease was also observed in the trade of books, newspapers, magazines and ststionery: "if, on the one hand, the purchase of school material led to the positive change of the sector agains December (0.3%), on the other, the decrease agains January last year (-7.3%) resulted from the substitution of the printed to the electronic media, mainly of magazines and nespapers", says Isabella.
