Mr. EB_

The holiday shopping season got off to a surprisingly solid start, with Black Friday sales up 3% (or 11%) from a year ago.

If you read the ShopperTrak estimate methodology on their website, they emphasize counting retail foot traffic. Obviously in this retail environment, old estimates based on how many people went out for Black Friday and correlation to actual total spending dollars is tenuous at best.

I mean ShopperTrak said retail sales were UP y/y September and October, and down tiny in November, give me a break.

Meanwhile, Mastercard Spendingpulse which is based on actual spending data from their credit card users, NOT estimates counting foot traffic, shows deep double digit y/y declines in sales dollars.