Retail trade

The retail trade index measures the monthly evolution of the turnover at current prices of enterprises with retail sale outlets. With effect from January 2013, the indices are calculated with reference to the base year 2010 using the Ateco 2007 classification (Italian edition of Nace Rev. 2).

In October 2017, the retail trade decreased by 2.1% compared with October 2016, all store types showed decline as food retailing was down 1.7% and non-food retailing was down 2.4%.

Estimates of the value of retail sales fell month-on-month also: -1.0% compared with September 2017.

The underlying pattern, as measured by the 3 month on 3 month estimate, showed a contraction in October 2017, where the value of sales decreased by 0.1% and the volume of sales was down 0.2%.

The volume of retail trade dropped by 2.9% compared with October 2016 and decreased by 1.1% compared with September 2017.

There were falls across all store types from the year prior: both large scale distribution and small and medium scale distribution reported recession, as the former was down 1.3% for food goods and was down 3.0% for non-food goods, while the latter was down 2.6% for food goods and was down 2.2% for non-food goods.