Euro Area retail sales unexpectedly fall in November

Eurozone retail sales fell 0.3% in November, according to Eurostat, cutting into October's upwardly revised 0.4% jump and marking the sharpest decline in retail volume since August.

On an annualised basis, retail sales fell 1.1% year-on-year for a 14th consecutive period of contraction.

Sales of food, beverages, and tobacco fell for a second month, down 0.1% in November, while non-food sales, with the exclusion of fuel, dropped by 0.4% amid a 1.2% slump in online retail.

Among the Euro Area's largest economies, retail volume contracted 2.5% in Germany, offsetting a 0.4% increase seen in France.

Pantheon Macroeconomics' Melanie Debono said: "Retail sales figures for November showed that the rebound in consumption remained broadly absent midway through Q4. That said, the slide in November was much smaller than we anticipated given the drop in retail sales in Germany. Sales fell by 2.5% on the month in the EZ’s largest economy. Luckily this was largely offset by increases elsewhere, not least in Spain and France, where sales rose by 1.5% and 0.4%, respectively. Portugal saw the biggest increase, by 3.0%."

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com