According to retail tracking experts ShopperTrak RCT Corp., this year's holiday shopping season, which officially began this past Friday, was off to a "very strong" start. To those economists and retail pundits that were buckled in for a bumpy ride to kick off the holiday shopping season, this is probably a big sign of relief. Yes, you can put those Pepto Bismol bottles down now, folks.

Although one report doesn't make a whole season better, the report from ShopperTrak estimated Black Friday sales this year up 8.3% over last year, with sales this past Friday alone totaling $10.3 billion from retail outlets across the U.S. ShopperTrak thought, as do I, that even in the face of rising energy prices and credit tightness due to risky loan defaults and mortgage resets, it takes a lot more than that for consumers to curb holiday spending.

The long haul now takes over, as estimates and details will pour in week by week through the Christmas holiday until it's very clear that the success from last week's Black Friday holiday spending kickoff will last all the way through December. Although today is Cyber Monday (when everyone begins shopping online at work), even online retailers saw excellent activity this past Friday. Visitors directed from www.shopping.com to its merchants increased 61% from 2006 levels, and eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) even said that customers are picking up their computer mice more than their car keys. That makes for a nice quote more than it gives us meaningful data. We'll see if it stacks up after results come in from today's online shopping activity.

The Associated Press reports that it will cost $19,507 to buy just once the items on the 12 Days of Christmas List this year, up 3% from 2006's $18,920.

PNC Wealth Management itemized the list (the 2006 figures are in parentheses):

• Partridge, $15 ($15)
• Pear Tree, $150 ($130)
• Two Turtle Doves, $40 ($40)
• Three French Hens, $45 ($45)
• Four Calling Birds (canaries), $600 ($480)
• Five Gold Rings, $395 ($325)

The head of Walmart.com says that Halloween sales were particularly strong. And, he thinks the upcoming holiday season will do just as well. "Customers are still spending for the holidays. Halloween was very good for us, so I suspect that Christmas is going to be great," said Raul Vazquez in a talk with Reuters.

The website may be benefiting from the fact that parent Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) cut holiday prices early this year, about a month ahead of the normal Thanksgiving weekend time frame.

But there could be other explanations. Wal-Mart has been especially good at tying its website to its stores. Customers can order items on the internet and pick them up at the local retail outlet, saving shipping charges. This combination of convenience and low price may be increasing use of the website.

The other reason the site may be doing well is the rotation away from buying goods in stores and toward buying online. While same-store sales at many big retailers are relatively flat, e-commerce revenue is expected to rise over 20% in the last two months of the year.

Or, there is one other explanation. Wal-Mart may be doing better than most investors think.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

Are PC sales dead? Far from it! The personal computer's demise has been predicted in many circles for years now as applications and tools move to the internet from the computer hard drive. But then again, you have Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) both releasing brand-new operating systems this year and trumpeting them all over the world. In Microsoft's case, it's Windows Vista and in Apple's case, it's the Leopard operating system.

The market continues to shift from powerful but bulky desktop PCs toward notebook PCs, and that trend will continue into the holiday season this year. It's scary to think that PC sales would eventually slow down after everyone has bought a notebook, but just in case that happens PC makers are shifting sales focus to markets outside the U.S., something that has been increasing in scale this year.

Let's put it this way -- out of the top consumer electronics "must have" items as measured for this holiday season by the Consumer Electronics Association, computers beat out big-screen TVs, clothes and money (among other things). As measured in the third quarter of this year, PC sales in the U.S. grew at about a 5% rate compared with a 15.5% rate across the rest of the globe.



So PCs are catching fire in many other areas outside the U.S. even as respectable single-digit growth happens here. For an old technology that just continues to apparently get better, PCs are long from dead. My guess is that the hardware is basically no more than a strong commodity, but the internet is what is driving sales of PCs. If you're not connected, then who are you? Someone in the market for a PC, that's who.

Although Black Friday is still about a month away, retail industry pundits are beginning to worry about the forecast possibility of a slow holiday shopping season. Such a scenario would cause jitters at national retailers like Target (NYSE: TGT) and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT). Will energy prices (like vehicle gas) and continued messes in home spending (and mortgage industry crises) make for a slow business season that's about to get under way?

That's the large question, and it's a doozy considering the damage homebuyers and lenders have faced this year that have called into question many homeowners' pocketbooks. If those folks curb spending to a large degree, the mess left in January will be noticeable to the market as well as business leaders across the nation. When consumers twitch their thumbs over holiday purchases (even small twitches), fortunes are made or lost in an instant. In other words, let's not let Black Friday turn into an above-average Friday.

Two of the larger retailers in the nation -- Target and Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) -- will be closely watched this holiday shopping season, just like the barometer-setting Wal-Mart. Consider this quote by George Rosenbaum, head of consumer research company Leo J. Shapiro and Associates: "I would say at this moment the outlook for Christmas does not look like it's going to be a better Christmas than last year, and it could be weaker."

Yikes -- does that spell doom for the November and December retail shopping season, or will consumers surprise many of us and spend away? If signs point to a week holiday shopping season, look for retailers to roll out the red carpet -- however that can be defined -- to get customer feet in those doors.

Hibbett Sporting Goods (NASDAQ: HIBB), an operator of approximately 593 Hibbett Sport stores, was recently down $1.44 to $26.55:

HIBB call option volume of 119 contracts compares to put volume of 873 contracts. HIBB October option implied volatility of 55 was above its 26-week average of 40 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price risk.

Crocs (NASDAQ: CROX) implied volatility elevated at 66 as CROX at record high:

CROX, a rapidly growing designer, manufacturer and marketer of footwear, was recently trading at $62.99. CROX is presenting at Thomas Weisel Consumer Conference on September 25th and the ICR London Consumer Conference on September 27th. CROX October option implied volatility of 66 was above its 26-week average of 55 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price risks.

Nordstrom (NYSE: JWN) volatility elevated at 35 into forward looking holiday sales:

JWN was recently down $2.31 to $48.40. JWN overall option implied volatility of 35 was above its 26-week average of 32 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price risks.

Daily options Update is provided by Stock Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com.

The National Retail Federation expects 2007 holiday sales to be up only 4%. That would make for the lowest gain since 2002. According to The Wall Street Journal "The NRF forecast follows a similarly gloomy one issued this week by TNS Retail Forward, a Columbus, Ohio, consulting company that predicted an increase of just 3.3% in fourth-quarter sales this year."

Anyone surprised by the news must have been living under a rock for the last two months. Mortgage defaults and falling home prices have made the US consumer feel as poor as a church mouse. If oil stays above $80, home energy and gas prices will begin to rise. There will be coal in the stockings this Christmas.

The prediction of slow retail sales during the most important season of the year leads to the question of whether a recession is upon the US economy and how deep it will be. Even as business spending has slowed, consumers have been willing to run up debt to continue to make purchases. Now, large retailers like Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) will have to face a customer who is tired of shopping.

But the consumer is beset by anxiety over the future of his earning power, the value of his home, and the direction of the economy. Ebenezer Scrooge cannot be far away.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 247wallst.com.

The top two consumer electronics retailers in the nation -- Best Buy Co., Inc. (NYSE:BBY) and Circuit City Stores, Inc. (NYSE:CC) -- reported that December sales exceeded analyst estimats on the backs of promotions like discounts on televisions and computers -- all of which attracted holiday shoppers. I immediately responded 'duh' after reading that fact.

Best Buy sales in the month of December grew 7% within stores that had been open at least 14 months, and Circuit City's same-store sales increased 4.2%. Naturally, shares of both BBY and CC are up this morning on the news, even with recently analyst comments of "the TV-sky is falling" with their predictions of flat-panel pricing in 2007 contributing to slow sales growth at both companies, especially with other competitors like Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) entering the fray.

Interestingly -- but not so surprising -- is that both flat-panel TVs and video-game consoles drove consumers to stores to start the biggest quarter of the year for both companies. In what looks like the start of a price war according to many analyst estimates, both Best Buy and Circuit City both lowered prices on flat-panel TVs to counter competition from Wal-Mart.

Let the TV games of 2007 begin.

Hey bulls, what's the deal with retail sales?They were lousy in November and stunk in December for everybody except for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE:WMT) and Costco Corp. (Nasdaq:COST).

Pundits are blaming the warm winter for the bad numbers. I don't buy that explanation. If people were confident about the economy, they would do their Christmas shopping in tank-tops, shorts and flip-flops. These figures underscore the disconnect between the positive vibes Wall Street has about the future and the negative ones given off by the general public.

Even Wal-Mart's figures weren't anything to brag about. The No. 1 retailer posted sales of 1.6 percent in December better than the 1 percent initial forecast. Investors greeted this figures with a big yawn, sending the company's stock down in pre-market trading. I don't take much solace in Costco's 9 percent upsurge in sales compared with analysts' forecasts of 5.6 percent. People must be concerned enough about the future that they are stocking the basements up with warehouse pallets of toilet paper and air freshener. They are showing a preference for Wal-Mart and Costco over BJ's Wholesale Inc (NYSE:BJ) which slashed its fourth-quarter forecast.

Between peoples' worries about the economy and Wall Street's anxiety about the Democrats takeover of Congress, there should be plenty of work this year for the nation's therapists.

Despite the launch of the new Microsoft Zune for the holiday season, Piper Jaffray is estimating that some 14-15 million iPods are going to roll off the shelves this winter. Gene Munster, the Apple guru over at Piper Jaffray, has taken a look at early October sales data and thinks Apple's iPod sales are trending positive. Very positive.

Even more positive is that the above sales analysis doesn't take into account the very stocking-friendly iPod Shuffle. Under $100, tiny enough to clip onto a belt loop, one can bet a number of those will sell quite nicely.

The digital player market is heating up as the temperatures get lower.

Apple ended the day at $85.61, up $1.56, or 1.86%.