February retail sales rose 0.1 percent on the month in value, indicative of modest strengthening of consumer appetite. Volumes have no change at 0.0 percent, with food increasing 0.1 percent and non-food showing no change at 0.0 percent.

On a yearly basis, nominal sales fell 1.5 percent, as the value of food sales fell 0.4 percent and that of non-food fell 2.2 percent. Volumes were down 2.5 percent on the year, with food down 2.9 percent and non-food down 2.4 percent. Within the non-food category the largest nominal decline was in shoes and leather goods (down 6.2 percent) and optical instruments and photographic equipment (down 4.8 percent).

Compared to January last year, the value of retail sales for large-scale distribution grew 0.5 percent while small-scale distribution grew 2.4 percent. Non-store retail sales grew 2.2 percent while E-commerce grew 1.9 percent.

Retail sales measure the total receipts at stores that sell durable and nondurable goods. The headline data are expressed in nominal terms but volume statistics are also available. Autos are excluded. Only a very limited breakdown of subsector performance is available in the first report but much greater detail is provided in the following month's release. The Italian National Institute of Statistics (Istat) is the main producer of official statistics in Italy.

With consumer spending a large part of the economy, market players continually monitor spending patterns. Retail sales are a measure of consumer well-being. The pattern in consumer spending is often the foremost influence on stock and bond markets. For stocks, strong economic growth translates to healthy corporate profits and higher stock prices. For bonds, the focus is whether economic growth goes overboard and leads to inflation. Ideally, the economy walks that fine line between strong growth and excessive (inflationary) growth.