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Cyber Monday online shopping expected to break holiday records

By Jean Lotus
Holiday shoppers on Cyber Monday are expected to order $12.7 billion worth of online items from Amazon.com and other online stores, Internet analysts said. File Photo by Friedemann Vogel/ EPA-EFE
Holiday shoppers on Cyber Monday are expected to order $12.7 billion worth of online items from Amazon.com and other online stores, Internet analysts said. File Photo by Friedemann Vogel/ EPA-EFE

Nov. 30 (UPI) -- Online holiday shoppers are expected to break Cyber Monday records with $12.7 billion worth of potential sales and many shoppers using their smartphones to buy and ship gifts, Internet analysts said.

Shoppers avoiding in-person shopping during the pandemic are rushing to have packages delivered from online stores like Amazon.com, Target and Walmart, ringing up about $189 billion over the holiday season, according to Adobe Analytics's Holiday Forecast. Sales will be 33% higher than last year, the company predicts.

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More than 40% of online shopping will be done on smartphones, up 55% from last year, Adobe predicted. Buyers will purchase $28 billion more in items with their phones than last year, the Internet analytic team said.

Even as Black Friday crowds in retail stores the day after Thanksgiving were muted due to health concerns of the coronavirus, buyers were still online, consumers still spent $6.3 million per minute online, or $27.50 per person, Adobe found.

Cyber Monday is on track to break all previous records for online sales," Taylor Schreiner, the director at Adobe Digital Insights, told CNBC in a statement. Shoppers will look for discounted toys, TVs and computers, Schreiner said.

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But items ordered on Tuesday, Dec. 1 will take advantage of the "golden day" for shipping, Adobe predicted.

Shopping should peak between 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. Pacific Time on Monday, the L.A. Times reported.

Shoppers will spend for the holidays even though their economic situation may be more precarious, predicted Jack Kleinhenz, chief economist at the National Federation of Retailers.

"Consumers have experienced a difficult year but will likely spend more than anyone would have expected just a few months ago," Kleinhenz said in a statement earlier in November.

"After all they've been through, we think there's going to be a psychological factor that they owe it to themselves and their families to have a better-than-normal holiday."

The trade association said that shoppers already started holiday shopping in early November, with almost 60% of surveyed shoppers getting started early, a 21% increase from a decade ago.

But a Gallup poll released Wednesday said that shoppers were planning to buy slightly less this holiday season compared to 2019. In a survey of 1,000 people, respondents said they intend to spend an average of $852 on holiday gifts, less than the $942 average Americans spent on gifts last year.

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