German retail sales rise in November

German retail sales, a closely watched measure of household confidence, rose for the second month in a row in November, official data showed on Wednesday.

Retailers' sales went up by 1.0 percent compared with October, the federal statistics office Destatis said in a statement.

The previous month, retail sales had increased by 2.0 percent.

On a 12-month basis, however, business decreased, slipping by 0.8 percent in November compared with the same month last year, the statisticians calculated.

But that was largely because there was one more shopping day in November 2013 than in November 2014.

Retail sales data are subsequent to frequent revision.

Taking the 11 months to November, German retail sales were up 1.1 percent over the year-earlier period, Destatis said.

And the statistics office said it expected retail sales for the whole year to have increased by 1.1-1.3 percent year-on-year.