Eurozone Retail Sales drop 0.8% YoY in December vs. -0.9% expected

• Eurozone Retail Sales came in at -0.8% YoY in December vs. -0.9% estimated.
• Retail Sales in the bloc arrived at -1.1% MoM in December vs. -1.0% forecast.

Eurozone’s Retail Sales declined 0.8% YoY in December, compared with a 0.4% drop in November, the official data released by Eurostat showed on Tuesday. The market had expected a decrease of 0.9%.

Retail Sales in the old continent dropped 1.1% over the month in the same period, as against 0.3% recorded in November and -1.0% expected.

FX implications

Mixed Eurozone data added to the renewed downtick in the Euro. At the time of writing, the EUR/USD pair is trading at 1.0730, losing 0.08% on the day.

About Eurozone Retail Sales

The Retail Sales released by Eurostat are a measure of changes in sales of the Eurozone retail sector. It shows the performance of the retail sector in the short term. Percent changes reflect the rate of changes of such sales. The changes are widely followed as an indicator of consumer spending. Usually, positive economic growth anticipates "Bullishness" for the EUR, while a low reading is seen as negative, or bearish, for the EUR.