Maybe the economy really is turning around after all. The holiday numbers are coming in now and it looks as if a surge of last-minute Christmas shoppers gave retailers the big boost they were looking for.

This marks a huge improvement from last year’s horrific Christmas shopping season. Last year sales fell 5.8% for the season which marked the steepest decline in at least 40 years.

A company by the name of Retail Metrics, which tracks earnings for 122 retailers across the United States, expects that the retail industry as a whole will post fourth-quarter profits that will equal or exceed 30%.

Internet Sales Numbers

Internet sales saw a nice boost as well growing 4% over the $28 billion mark which was posted in 2008. Internet shopping brought in $29.1 billion in 2009.

The largest growth in Internet sales went to jewelry and watches. They posted an impressive 20% increase. Consumer-electronics such as TVs also posted an impressive increase of 15%.

By the Numbers

The major retail chains reported the following sales data:

Costco +9%
Target +1.8%
JCPenney -3.8%
Kohl’s +4.7%
Neiman Marcus +4.5%
Nordstrom +7.4%
Macy’s +1%
Saks +9.9%

Major clothing stores reported:

Abercrombie & Fitch -19%
American Eagle +7%
Gap +2%

Profits look to be healthy as well due to the fact that the retailers did not slash prices in order to boost sales. It should be noted that the largest retailer of them all, Wal-Mart, does not release monthly data.

There of course will be a series of other retail reports coming forward in the weeks to follow as well so we will see if they match the findings that Retail Metrics came up with.

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