Over 166 million Americans are expected to shop from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday this year, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF), as consumers shake off inflation worries in search of holiday deals.
This figure is almost 8 million more people participating in the weekend "Black Friday" sales event than last year and is the highest estimate since NRF began tracking this data in 2017.
"While there is much speculation about inflation's impact on consumer behavior, our data tells us that this Thanksgiving holiday weekend will see robust store traffic with a record number of shoppers taking advantage of value pricing," NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said in a statement. "We are optimistic that retail sales will remain strong in the weeks ahead."
According to the NRF survey, 59% of shoppers say they are looking for deals too good to pass up this year. And they might just get their wish this year, as the markdowns are expected to be steeper, according to multiple sector Chief Financial Officers' statements during their respective recent earnings calls, the Wall Street Journal reports.
"We're just prepared to compete when the consumer is ready to shop," Gap (NYSE: GPS) CFO Katrina O'Connell said on an earnings call. "We know we have to get out ahead of ensuring that we're early enough, that we're promoting at a time when [consumers are] willing to buy, and we're not waiting too late to clear the merchandise. And on the flip side, if they're not going to shop until later, we don't want to be too far ahead of it."
Some CFOs like like Macy's (NYSE: M) Adrian Mitchell and Kohl's (NYSE: KSS) Jill Timm see this holiday promotional season as a way to attract more customers, while CFOs like Target's (NYSE: TGT) Michael Fiddelke and Bath & Body Works' (NYSE: BBWI) are hoping the sales shopping will help clean out bloated inventories.
As the retail sector enters one of its biggest shopping periods of the year, exchange-traded funds (ETF) expected to benefit include SPDR S&P Retail ETF (NYSE: XRT), ProShares Online Retail ETF (NYSE: ONLN), and VanEck Vectors Retail ETF (NASDAQ: RTH). They could use some more support too from robust consumer spending, as each fund is down about 27%, 48%, and 13% for their respective year-to-dates.