US retail sales unexpectedly rise

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US retail sales unexpectedly increased by 1% in January, which economists suggest is due to New Year discounting.

The rise was the first monthly gain in seven months, and followed a revised 3% fall in December. Analysts had expected a 0.8% decline last month.

Excluding car and auto parts, sales in January rose by 0.9%. Petrol sales rose 2.6% as prices continued to fall.

On an annual basis, sales last month were down 9.7% compared with January 2008, said the Commerce Department.

The increase between December and January was the biggest since November 2007.

'Puzzling'

"It is a bit of a puzzle because consumer fundamentals remain poor," said economist Zach Pandl, of Nomura Securities International.

"Maybe retailers lured shoppers with aggressive discounting."

Fellow analyst, Brian Dolan, chief currency strategist at Forex.com said the January figures looked "a bit hollow".

"The rebound in retail sales looks like a bounce-back after extremely weak numbers the prior month," he said.

Last week, figures showed that the rate of unemployment in the US hit a 17-year high in January.