(National) Returns Day
In the last 30 days we all experienced several so called ‘retail holidays’: first was the kickoff of the holiday retail season, Black Friday, the shopping frenzy that takes place the day after Thanksgiving. Cyber Monday followed suit (three days later) with impressive online deals, breaking yet another retail sales record. A lesser known event is Green Monday, which was the second Monday of December, often referred to as ‘Cyber Monday 2’, and started back in 2007 after certain retailers noticed an increase in sales on the 2nd Monday of December. And, did you know about Free Shipping Day? This is a one-day event held annually in mid-December when consumers receive free shipping with a guaranteed delivery date by Christmas Eve. While these four special retail “holidays,” along with all of the other shopping days leading up to Christmas, have come and gone, there’s one more “retail holiday” that actually took place this week (January 3rd) ‘National Returns Day’, the day people returned unwanted presents they were gifted. In the United States, UPS said it expected having shipped more returns back to retailers than ever before: about 1.4 million packages on Wednesday alone. And, that’s just through UPS. Other carriers such as FedEx and the United States Post Office will also be shipping back their share of unwanted merchandise.
Investors also returned to the financial markets with global equities beginning the first trading week of 2018 with a record-breaking start to the year. On Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average Index (DJI) crossed the 25.000 points mark for the first time ever closing at exactly 25.075points. The DJI is basically continuing the 2017 trend when in 2017 it crossed no less than five 1.000-point milestones moving from 19.762 points at the end of 2016 to 24.719 points end of December 2017, or an increase of approximately 25% (!). European investors eventually also joined the rally with the FTSE 100 in London hitting a record peak above 7.700 points.
Although not record breaking, the Ageas share also benefited from this overall positive investment sentiment. This this trading week, the Ageas share increased by 1.9% to EUR 41.50 with the Eurostoxx 50 & the SXIP 600 Insurance index respectively increasing by 2.9% & 1.4%.