Mortgage refinancing no sales help
Anyone who expects record mortgage refinancing this year to boost retailers’ holiday sales is going to be disappointed, according to Daniel Barry, a Merrill Lynch & Co. analyst.The holiday season may be the worst in a decade, according to Barry, the top-ranked department-store stock analyst in Institutional Investor magazine’s rankings for seven straight years. Discounters such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Dollar General Corp. ought to do best during the slowdown, in his view.
