Reverse Market Insight

Retail Falls, but Signs of Growth 

Reverse Market Insight (RMI) points to an interesting contradiction in their latest Retail Leaders Report for January 2011.  Although volume decreased by 1.4% from December and by 15.3% from the previous January, RMI sees signs of year over year growth by March of this year. Most lenders would be concerned about a January that lagged behind a holiday shortened December, especially when it also trails the previous year.  Raising additional concern is the number of lenders participating in January increasing by 18.9% over December.  However, RMI points to two components that fuel their optimism of annual growth in volume.