Not that you were going to, but take no solace in Thursday’s ostensible “beat” for US retail sales.

Yes, nominal spending rose a brisk 0.8% in September from August, and yes, that was nearly triple consensus. But no, it isn’t necessarily indicative of a “resilient” consumer.

As ever — and I realize this is basic stuff for a lot of you, but it bears repeating for those not steeped in such things — what matters in the retail sales release is the control group, which strips out gas and restaurant receipts, car sales and construction materials.

As the figure shows, the control group measure barely rose, managing a meager 0.1% advance in September following a blockbuster advance the prior month.

To be sure, Thursday’s release from the Commerce Department wasn’t “bad” in any sweeping sense. Restaurant and bar receipts rose 1.1%, for example, and Americans were still spending on furniture and electronics, at least in nominal terms.

But a flatlining control group during a month when core inflation ran 0.335%, ain’t gonna work. As BMO’s Ian Lyngen put it, “this represents a decline in real spending.”

That “isn’t a new dynamic for the US consumer” in 2026, he went on, but when taken with Thursday’s huge PPI overshoot, it “reinforce[s] concerns that the consumer is facing headwinds from higher prices” as the holiday shopping season quickly approaches.