Where The Heck Was The “Festive Spirit?"

Wolf Richter   www.testosteronepit.com   www.amazon.com/author/wolfrichter Shocked and appalled—that was the reaction to the shopping-season debacle unfolding in the US. It was triggered by MasterCard’s SpendingPulse report that poured ice-cold water on expectations of a 3% sales growth. But now there’s a new term to describe “consumer spending,” “consumer debt,” and ultimately “trade deficits” when they occur as a function of such uplifting concepts as “holiday season” or “Christmas” whose magic is boiled down to just one issue: how much did everyone spend? Who came up with it? Retailer par excellence, Michel-Edouard Leclerc, CEO of E.Leclerc, France’s largest retailer with a market share of 18%. He faced a challenging environment as unemployment soared above 10% and as the already an...