Retail sales in Croatia increased by 3.1 percent in August 2018 compared to August 2017, posting a year-on-year increase for the 48th month in a row, the state statistics bureau said on Friday.

Retail sales increased by 0.7 percent from July 2018, when they rose by 2.2 percent year-on-year.

“The positive trend in retail trade, with the increasing of year-on-year growth rates, continued in August, extending the trend which began in September 2014,” Raiffeisenbank Austria (RBA) analysts said in their comment of the report.

The increase in retail sales in August was mainly driven by the year-on-year jump in car sales of 31.5 percent.

Over the first eight months of this year, retail sales increased by 3.5 percent in real terms compared with the same period last year. The increase was buoyed by positive indicators from the labour market and tourism, the continued growth of nominal and real wages, as well as a modest recovery of loan activity.

RBA analysts said they expected personal spending would continue to be the main vehicle spurring growth in the quarters ahead.

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