UK retail sales plunge 19% in April due to coronavirus lockdown – BRC
|The British Retail Consortium (BRC) survey showed on Wednesday, the UK consumer spending fell by 20% in April, in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic led social and economic lockdown.
Key findings
“The BRC members reported a 19.1% drop in total sales last month compared with April last year, the biggest fall since it began its monthly index in 1995.
Over the three months to April, in-store sales of non-food items plunged by 36.0% while food sales over the period rose by 6.0% as consumers stocked up on essentials for the government’s coronavirus shutdown.
By contrast, online non-food sales leapt by nearly 60% in April to account for more than two-thirds of non-food spending.”
Separately, “Barclaycard, part of Barclays Bank said credit and debit card spending plunged by 36.5% compared with a year earlier as spending on travel, pubs and restaurants collapsed,” as cited by Reuters.
Market reaction
GBP/USD is consolidating the bounce from three-week lows of 1.2251 ahead of the critical UK data releases. The spot, currently, trades at 1.2278, up 0.15% on the day.
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