Today, the National Bureau of Statistics released the macroeconomic "data package" for November. At first glance, the macro consumption data appears relatively weak, with overall retail sales only growing by 3% year-on-year, and the growth rate further dropping to 2.5% after excluding automobiles. Several categories of discretionary goods (above designated size), such as tobacco and alcohol, clothing, and cosmetics, saw negative year-on-year sales growth in November.

However, similar to last year, various e-commerce platforms once again advanced the start time of the "Double Eleven" shopping festival, leading to an earlier surge in shopping demand in October. Therefore, the decline in November needs to be viewed in conjunction with the uptick in October. Specifically:

1. Has "Double Eleven" become "Double Ten" shopping festival?

First, let's look at the online retail, which has the most significant impact on the fluctuations in retail sales from October to November. As shown in the chart below, this year, major e-commerce platforms generally started the preheating phase for the Double Eleven shopping festival before October 15. In 2023, it was generally after the 20th.

The further advancement of the timeline has led to more shopping demand being brought forward and released in October. Correspondingly, the year-on-year growth rate of online (adjusted) physical retail in October reached 11%, showing a significant uptick compared to the growth range of 4% to 8% in the previous three months. In contrast, the growth rate of physical retail in November quickly dropped to 5.2%.

Assuming there was no impact from the pre-emptive shopping festival, the online physical growth rate in October would be similar to September at 6.5%. The pre-emptive online physical consumption amount for the shopping festival would be 60.5 billion, and assuming it also drives 15% of online non-physical and other channel consumption, then the total impact of the pre-emptive shopping festival would be 69.6 billion.

After adding back the aforementioned pre-emptive impact, the growth rate of online physical retail in November is approximately 9.5%. The overall retail sales growth rate also rises from the 3% reported this season to 4.6%.

It is evident that the fluctuation in growth rates largely stems from the mismatch in shopping festival timing. Therefore, it is more meaningful to look at the combined data for October and November.

When October and November are combined, the online physical retail growth rate for the two months in 2024 is 7.9%, which is a moderately high performance compared to the growth rates in previous months. The combined year-on-year growth rate for overall retail sales for the two months is 3.9%, which is also a decent performance compared to the 2% to 3% in previous months.

2. Offline dining consumption slightly improved in November In contrast, the service consumption that is less affected by the Double Eleven promotion did not show a trend of first rising and then falling between October and November. This month, the National Bureau of Statistics did not release the overall growth rate of service consumption expenditure, but taking dining expenditure as an example, although the 4% year-on-year growth rate this season is also weak in absolute terms, both in terms of year-on-year growth and compared to the compound growth rate of 2021, the dining consumption situation in November has improved compared to October.

3. Automotive, home appliances, and furniture are gradually improving, while clothing and beauty products are struggling in a quagmire?

From the perspective of product categories, automotive retail, which has the largest single weight (accounting for about 1/4 of the total retail sales above the limit), performed well in both October and November, with growth rates exceeding 10% in both months. However, this also means that the growth rate of retail sales excluding automotive retail will be lower, with a combined year-on-year growth of 3.1% over the two months, which is basically consistent with the growth rates of 2.9% to 3.3% from July to September.

For other major categories, the growth rate of essential food and oil has remained basically unchanged over the past four months, while optional items such as clothing and cosmetics have shown a significant increase in October followed by a sharp decline in November, which should have a clear correlation with the advance of the Double Eleven promotion.

Additionally, the home appliances and furniture category should benefit directly from national subsidies, maintaining good growth during October and November. Communication products (such as mobile phones) may have experienced negative growth in November as they were not yet included in the scope of national subsidies at that time.

Excluding the impact of the advance promotion, from the perspective of cumulative growth rates: the cumulative growth rate of optional clothing, shoes, hats, and cosmetics is significantly lower than that of food and oil, but there has been some improvement compared to the growth rates in August and September. The cumulative growth rates of sales in home appliances, furniture, and automotive categories have continued to rise over the past four months, indicating ongoing improvement in prosperity.

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November Social Retail Commentary: "Double Eleven" turns into "Double Ten" is the "behind-the-scenes manipulator"