Italian consumption takes your breath away. According to the latest Istat data, in August the retail sales in our country they remained unchanged on a monthly basis, but recorded a slight growth on an annual basis: +0,2%. This ends a haemorrhage of negative data that lasted 13 consecutive months.
As for the components of the individual data, between July and August the sales of food products did not undergo any change, while those of non-food products fell by 0,1%; on an annual basis, however, sales increased by 1% for food products, while they recorded a decrease of 0,4% for non-food products.
It is mainly the food discounters that are doing business: in August, sales increased by 3,6% on an annual basis, while small shops lost 1,1%, despite the general recovery that took place in the month. In particular, looking at large-scale distribution (+1,7%), supermarkets (+1,3%) and hypermarkets (+0,6%) also recorded positive signs in August.
In comparison with the first eight months of 2012, sales of food products decreased by 1,2% and those of non-food products by 3,0%, for an overall decrease of 2,2%. On average for the June-August quarter, the seasonally adjusted index marks a drop of 0,2% compared to the previous three months.
