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
The largest U.S. retail trade group is forecasting that the country’s retail sales will increase anywhere between 2.5% and 3.5% this year, a solid but still slower pace than the 3.6% seen last year.
The National Retail Federation said Wednesday that it expects retail sales will reach between $5.23 trillion and $5.28 trillion this year.
The 2024 forecast is roughly in line with the 10-year pre-pandemic average annual sales growth of 3.6%.
“The economy is primarily supported by consumers who have shown much greater resilience than expected, and it’s hard to be bearish on the consumer,” the federation’s chief economist, Jack Kleinhenz, said. “The question for 2024 ultimately is, will consumer spending maintain its resilience?”
In a rare move on Wall Street, Chipotle Mexican Grill’s board has approved a 50-for-1 stock split.
The burrito chain lauded the proposed split as one of the biggest in New York Stock Exchange history — while noting it believed the move would also boost accessibility of the company’s stock.
“This is the first stock split in Chipotle’s 30-year history, and we believe this will make our stock more accessible to employees as well as a broader range of investors,” Jack Hartung, Chipotle’s chief financial and administrative officer, said in a prepared statement.
Under the proposal, the board has approved a 50-for-1 stock split — meaning each Chipotle share is set to be split into 50 smaller shares. If that split was done today, the price of Chipotle’s stock, which stood at around $2,900 midday Wednesday, would soon cost just $58.