- Is the retail rally over? After a 10-month period in which the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (NYSEARCA:XRT) outperformed the S&P 500 by 1.2K basis points, since April 2 the XRT has underperformed by 270 basis points - off 0.4% as the S&P 500 has added 2.3%.
- The reversal comes alongside a major bounce in oil, up more than 30% since bottoming in mid-March. The thinking isn't too complicated - falling oil prices put more money in consumers pockets to spend at places like Wal-Mart, and surging oil prices is pulling money out.
- As it turns out though, consumers didn't spend as much of the saved money as thought, with core retail sales shy of estimates for the last four months, and the savings rate hitting its highest level since December 2012.
- Source: Bloomberg
- Retail ETFs: XLP, XLY, VDC, XRT, VCR, RTH, RETL, FXG, PBJ, IYK, IYC, FXD, PEJ, FDIS, RHS, FSTA, SCC, UCC, RCD, PMR, PEZ, UGE, PSL, PSCC, PSCD, SZK