German Retail Sales Rise In February

(RTTNews) - Germany's retail sales increased in February on higher food and non-food turnover, data from Destatis showed on Monday.

Retail sales increased 0.8 percent from the prior month, slightly faster than the revised 0.7 percent rise in January.

Economists had forecast sales to remain flat after January's initially estimated growth of 0.2 percent.

Sales in the food retail sector moved up 0.8 percent in real terms. At the same time, non-food retail sales gained 0.6 percent. In e-commerce and mail order, sales registered a real increase of 1.0 percent in February.

On a yearly basis, retail sales growth improved to 4.9 percent from 3.3 percent in the previous month.