The Consumer Just Crashed: Credit Card Spending Unexpectedly Cratered In September

Two weeks ago, we laid out the various reasons why - according to JPMorgan and Goldman - sentiment on US consumer stocks had cratered, and would continue to worsen.

After a brief short squeeze at the end of September, the XRT retail ETF is at the lowest level since June after peaking on the "last Fed hike" in late July, and as we enter into 4Q, there is a lot on the line in the consumer space, something that has not been lost on the market. Indeed, as Goldman's Prime Brokerage recently noted, shorting in the consumer discretionary space is at YTD highs as a result of a growing multitude of macro issues.