Retail sales in Colombia rose 3.0 percent year-on-year in January 2019, easing from an upwardly revised 7.1 percent gain in the previous month and below market expectations of a 4.5 percent increase. In January, 12 out of 16 product segments recorded gains including alcoholic beverages & tobacco (17.3 percent); cleaning products for domestic use (10.2 percent); other goods (9.3 percent); electronic products for personal or domestic use (7.3 percent); food & non-alcoholic beverages (7.0 percent); hardware, glass & paintings (5.7 percent); clothing & textiles (1.8 percent); and vehicles fuel (1.4 percent). On a monthly basis, retail trade went down 28.8 percent, after an upwardly revised 23.3 percent rise in the prior month. Retail Sales YoY in Colombia averaged 5.12 percent from 2000 until 2018, reaching an all time high of 23.37 percent in April of 2011 and a record low of -7.59 percent in September of 2009.
Retail Sales YoY in Colombia is expected to be 3.80 percent by the end of this quarter, according to Trading Economics global macro models and analysts expectations. Looking forward, we estimate Retail Sales YoY in Colombia to stand at 4.20 in 12 months time. In the long-term, the Colombia Retail Sales YoY is projected to trend around 4.10 percent in 2020, according to our econometric models.