E-commerce has gotten a serious shot in the arm this year. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, online store sales have increased over 18% through the first half of 2020, doing some serious heavy lifting to offset the 3.4% overall decline in retail sales compared to the first half of 2019.
What is particularly astonishing to me is that even with the massive shift, the Census Bureau figures imply that less than 20% of shopping is done via the internet. With COVID-19 altering consumer behavior, rendering many businesses redundant, and accelerating technology trends, I think e-commerce will continue to grow at a rapid pace this year and for many more years to come. Etsy (NASDAQ: ETSY) is thus at the top of my buy list in August.
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