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Today's big stories

UK retail sales fell unexpectedly in February, but Brits still paid more than the month before
Our analyst has looked into how to profit as we head into a new "market narrative" – Read Now
Chinese electric vehicle maker Nio reported mixed results

Dress Code

What’s Going On Here?

Data out on Friday showed that UK retail sales fell last month, even if the country’s shoppers have been swapping slippers for sneakers.

What Does This Mean?

Brits said farewell to the last of their Covid restrictions in February, and it looks like they couldn’t wait to get out and about: clothing and footwear sales were up 13% from the month before, and fuel sales were up 4%. Unfortunately, that’s where the spending stopped: sales at household goods stores fell by 3%, as home improvement habits ground to a halt. Online retail sales were down 5% too, which means they made up the smallest proportion of overall retail sales since the start of the pandemic in March 2020. All in all, that led overall retail sales to shrink 0.3% from January – a long way off the 0.7% growth economists were expecting.

Why Should I Care?

Zooming in: Vote of no confidence.
Shoppers might’ve been buying less, but they spent 0.7% more as inflation in the country continued to climb. No wonder they’re not feeling too hot: data out last week showed UK consumer confidence fell in March for the fourth month in a row, hitting its lowest since the depths of the pandemic in November 2020. And since prices are only set to climb, Brits might be forced to cut back even more in the next few months…

The bigger picture: Softly, softly.
This data suggests the Bank of England might’ve been right to change its tone earlier this month, when it suggested that it might need to go a little easier on interest rate hikes than it thought. Now, though, some economists are speculating that it might not raise rates at all in the second half of this year – especially as another spike in the UK’s Covid cases proves the country’s economy isn’t out of the woods yet.

You might also like: Will higher-for-longer energy prices bleed us all dry?

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Analyst Take

How To Get Ahead Of The Next Major Market Narrative

Stéphane Renevier, Analyst

What’s Going On Here?

Investors are constantly trying to explain why markets are behaving the way they are.

And they do that in part by telling themselves new stories every few months: market narratives that allow them to rationalize every shift and make decisions accordingly.

Right now, that narrative is centered on reflation: the combination of high growth and high inflation that has seen stock prices climb pretty relentlessly.

But there are some pretty glaring signs that we’re about to turn the page on that particular narrative.

So that’s today’s Insight: what the narrative could be about to shift to, and how to put yourself in a position to profit before it does.

Read or listen to the Insight here

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