-- Canadian retail sales for the month of February and the preliminary estimate for March will be released on Friday, said Scotiabank.
Statistics Canada had previously indicated that February's nominal sales were tracking a gain of almost 1% month-over-month seasonally adjusted. That may be revised, which isn't uncommon, and required details like volumes versus prices and sector breakdowns will be offered, noted the bank.
March is a bit of a wildcard and only the headline preliminary estimate will be offered, stated Scotiabank.
Q1 is tracking the fastest growth in retail sales volumes since H2 2024, pointed out the bank. That's based on the Q4 average, the surge in January and Scotiabank's estimate of the volume portion of the preliminary guidance for February's sales, while holding March unchanged to focus the math on what is known.
Investors will learn more this week, but this measure correlates very strongly with goods spending by consumers within the gross domestic product accounts.