2023-05-20 18:49:36
“Las crisis begin and end when the consumer He wants them to start and end.” The opinion, issued a few weeks ago by the president of the association of manufacturers and distributors AECOC, Ignacio GonzalezIt seems prescient. Because, although the European Commission or the Bank of Spain have just improved their growth forecasts for the Spanish economy or yesterday the CIS published that consumer confidence rose in April, in practice, consumption does not refloat: despite the fact that the Easter He took a breath that reached even the food industrywhich accumulates months of sales pushbacksince mid-April the trend has been negative again.
Algoria data analytics company consumption that has just introduced its platform to the market, identified a notable improvement in the volume of products purchased in the supermarket from mid-March to the week of April 10 (Easter monday), and a subsequent drop that has not reversed since. The first week of May, 6% fewer items were purchased in the supermarket than a year ago, and even the spending in the shopping cart decreased (-7.5%) even with the inflation, which should lead to an increase in spending.
He Aldi Fresco Observatorya study that is largely based on surveys carried out in April, also indicates that 60% of consumers have reduced the purchase of fresh products in the supermarket (pan, delicatessen, eggs, carne, fish, fruit, vegetables…) and in this same direction point the data of AECOCwhich at the end of April spoke of 45% of consumers acknowledging that they were buying less meat and another 39% doing the same with fish.
Brake on card spending
However, the wound seems to go beyond the food universe. The analysis of consumption behavior of BBVA Research shows a graph that descends from the first week of April and that reaches its lowest point since January 2022 during the first of May, when consumption contracted 7.8% in relation to the previous year. Despite the fact that the latest data available shows a slight improvement, as of May 7 consumption was still almost 6% lower.
And a similar conclusion is reached by the homologous monitor of Caixabank Researchwhich detected 3% less than card payments of Spanish buyers at the end of April, which recovers in May but without progress beyond that. “If we stop to observe face-to-face card consumption (…) we see that its growth rate (9% year-on-year) gives us a relatively positive sign, given that it slightly improves the April records, although it continues at moderate levels ”, analyzes in his weekly report the economist at Caixabank Research, Javier Ibanez de Aldecoa. “By spending sectors, the dynamics that we have been observing in recent months are maintained, with greater strength in the consumption linked to tourism and leisurein the face of the greatest weakness of the retail consumption”, adds this expert.
In fact, a large part of what explains why the fall in consumption is not more drastic is the turismo (the increase in spending on foreign cards registered by Caixabank ranges between 13% and 48% since the beginning of the year) and due to the good performance of certain categories.
Polarization of consumption
“There is once again a lot of polarization: there are people for whom things are going well and spend, and people who are fair and then press, and this is becoming more acute,” outlines the president of the Retail Commission of the Association of Economists of Catalonia, Nuria Beltran, who sees the fall in consumption as logical, taking into account that for years practically half of the Spanish population has admitted having difficulties making ends meet. In his opinion, it is compatible that an economy so based on third sector show signs of improvement at the ‘macro’ level if tourism is going well, but so resentful under a ‘micro’ review when the scenario is this. “Salaries have not progressed and thus the salary cannot rise much. internal consumptionmore in a stage of rise in electricity pricesof the combustible and of the feeding like the one we have had ”, maintains the economist.
On the other hand, it is true that the textilethe beauty and the activity in bars and restaurants they seem to go like a shot, but even here there are nuances. “Textiles receded a lot with the pandemic, so surely it is only recovering positions”, Beltran ventures, who also puts on the table the “post-pandemic psychological effect” to explain the good behavior of the activity in the cosmetic industry and in bars and restaurants. And although in the first case, in that of beauty, there is an absolute consensus that it is in one of its best moments, this is not the case in the case of restoration. “There are still fewer bars than before the covid -says a source who knows the sector well- and no matter how full they are, many businesses admit that they do detect some cost containment by customers.”
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