Good news: US retail sales held up last month despite deteriorating consumer sentiment.

Bad news: The increase was attributable in no small part to cars, which Americans ran out to buy in anticipation of higher prices stemming from Donald Trump’s auto tariffs.

Wednesday’s readout from the Census Bureau showed a 1.4% advance on the headline, matching estimates. It was the strongest showing since an anomalous surge in January of 2023.

Sales at car dealers rose 5.7% MoM and more than 9% YoY.

As the figure shows, the control group printed a 0.4% gain. That was below estimates. Consensus there was 0.6%. The ex-autos print, a 0.5% advance, was in-line.

Generally speaking, this was a decent report. 11 of 13 categories showed a gain, including food and drinking places, the only services sector category in the release. A 1.8% gain on that line counted as encouraging, particularly given expectations for a pullback in services sector spending.

As with every other data point, the figures will be viewed by traders as stale in light of the “Liberation Day” escalation and the rather dramatic impact on markets, sentiment and inflation expectations.

All in all, the numbers won’t move any needles, not at the Fed and not on Wall Street either. As I put it last week, anything that didn’t happen five minutes ago’s old news.