Year-on-year estimates of retail trade index showed falls in December 2017, decreasing by 0.1% in terms of value and 0.9% in terms of volume. For the whole of 2017, value of sales grew by 0.2% while volume contracted by 0.6%.

Looking at the quarterly movement (Quarter 4), the 3 months to December 2017 pattern stays relatively flat (+0.1%). In the same period the volume of retail trade decreased by 0.2%, due to a decline in food sales.

The month-on-month picture reported falls in December 2017 as both value index and volume index decreased by 0.3%.