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ECONOMY

Retail sales resist dire downturn in 2009

German retail sales fell by around 2.0 percent in 2009 from the previous year, an official estimation said Thursday as consumption fared better than Europe's biggest economy in general.

Retail sales resist dire downturn in 2009
Photo: DPA

“Private consumption has been an important cushion of the recession,” ING senior economist Carsten Brzeski commented, though he noted that retail sales figures were often revised later.

Economists warned that consumption began to slump heavily in the second half of the year and that Germany could soon find itself in a consumer recession.

The federal statistics office’s provisional figure is based on data from the first 11 months of the year.

At constant prices however, the drop was expected to be between 2.5 and 2.7 percent, the Federal Statistics Office (Destatis) said.

That is nonetheless better than a contraction of around five percent forecast for the overall economy last year, its worst slump since World War II.

A key factor supporting consumption was the less-than-expected rise in unemployment, in large part the result of government subsidised short-work schemes, from which around one million workers benefit at present.

The retail sector federation HDE and many economists are prudent regarding 2010 meanwhile, because unemployment is expected to climb despite a pickup in exports and industrial output.

In November, retail sales lost a steep 1.1 percent from their level the previous month, according to seasonally adjusted figures released by Destatis.

Brzeski termed the November figure “a setback.”

UniCredit counterpart Alexander Koch said the fourth quarter of last year would show a decline and added: “A consumer recession in the second half of 2009 is in the cards.

“The early Christmas shopping period didn’t bring a boost to retail sales – quite the contrary,” he noted.

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SHOPPING

Danish stores to remove MobilePay from payment options

Over 500 shops in Denmark will no longer offer the popular app MobilePay as a payment option after the platform ordered merchants to purchase new hardware.

Danish stores to remove MobilePay from payment options

The Dagrofa corporation, which owns chains including the Meny and Spar supermarkets, has announced it will remove MobilePay as a payment option in its stores, business media Finans reports.

The decision could impact less than 1 percent of payments in the store which are currently made using MobilePay, the company said.

READ ALSO: 17 essential phone apps to make your life in Denmark easier

“The primary reason is that MobilePay will from now on demand a technical setup for the payment system in stores and with the investment that will neee, we have concluded that’s not the way we want to go,” Dagrofa’s head of communications Morten Vestberg told Finans.

Dagrofa owns the Let-Køb and Min Købmand convenience store chains in addition to Meny and Spar.

The decision will mean MobilePay is removed from some 530 stores altogether, although individual stores may choose to retain the payment app.

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