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The National Instant Criminal Background Check System numbers decreased significantly for November 2025 compared to November 2024. An increase in firearm sales is normal for November. It happened in 2025, but firearm sales are 7% lower than those in November 2024. About 1.41 million firearm sales occurred in November of 2025, as estimated by the National Shooting Sports Foundation. 1.51 million firearms were estimated to be sold in November last year. The number of background checks for November was much lower than expected, about 2.09 million. It is the lowest number of background checks in November since 2014, more than...

Black Friday spending surged this year to new highs, fueled by record-breaking online spending that reached $11.8 billion on Black Friday alone, according to market data. Online sales made on Black Friday made up about 10% of total sales for the month of November, more than $111 billion dollars, according to Adobe Analytics’s report on holiday shopping trends. This represents a 9.1% increase in online sales compared to last year. Adobe tracks over 1 trillion U.S. retail site visits.

GrabAGun, the first publicly traded firearms retailer, has outperformed the overall industry in sales in 2025. Marc Nemati, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), stated that sales increased by 16% compared to an industry decline. Sales are good despite the stock price dropping 70% after the company went public. In 2025, Donald Trump Jr. became an advisor, then a stockholder in GrabAGun. GrabAGun went public in July 2025, becoming the first and currently only firearms retailer listed on the NYSE. GrabAGun is designated PEW on the NYSE.The price of the stock increased from approximately $11.80 in early January to over $17.20 on...

The adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) numbers from the FBI show almost no change for firearms sales and for background checks, comparing October 2025 with October 2024.There has been a slight decrease in adjusted firearms sales, from 1.303 million to 1.299 million, a difference of about 0.3% of sales. The total NICS background checks fell from 2.298 million to 2.289 million, about a 0.4% decrease in background checks. There have only been four Octobers in the last 26 years with numbers higher than those in 2024 and 2025.NSSF NICS Report October 2025 NSSF NICS Report October 2025...

How does a mere mortal—in this case, an average American girl in a stars-and-stripes dress with a red cardigan—transform into a Beatles-esque global phenom? Taylor Swift was performing from a young age and showed potential for success, surely, but few could have anticipated the unprecedented level of stardom she’d reach. By pairing her talent and artistry with incredible entrepreneurial instincts, Swift is not only building a musical legacy; she has built a reputation for bold, effective fanbase development. Swift’s early success as a teenage country music star was straight out of the entrepreneur’s playbook. She seized an opportunity that other...

In September 2025, the number of firearm sales, as measured by the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), adjusted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), was approximately two percent higher than it was in September 2024. This reversed the slightly downward trend in firearm sales that started in February 2025. The reductions have not been enormous, ranging from 2 to 7 percent for each individual month. Those reductions have been keenly felt in an industry accustomed to significant expansion during the Obama and Biden administrations.While the numbers used to approximate firearm sales increased by about two percent, the...

In August 2025, the adjusted National Instant background Check System (NICS), as computed by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), showed approximate firearm sales of a bit over a million, down about 10% from sales in August 2024. NICS checks, which can be used for other things besides firearm sales, dropped more than 19%. In the last twelve months, only September 2024 and January 2025 showed more adjusted checks than the month from a year earlier. Both months showed only a small increase. Except for January 2025, all of the months in the second Trump administration show fewer adjusted NICS...

The National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) numbers are in for July 2025. This is the first month in almost six years that the adjusted NICS numbers estimate less than one million firearm sales.The adjusted figures, as computed by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), are almost 22,000 sales short of one million at 978,731.In July of 2024, the NSSF calculated adjusted gun sales of 1,064,791. These figures show an eight percent drop in gun sales from last July. The NICS checks themselves fell by only four percent, from 2,021,235 to 1,936,621. About half of NICS checks are being...

The North Fork doesn’t want to be the Hamptons 2.0, but the area’s record-setting sales say otherwise. The 30-mile-long Long Island peninsula enjoyed another historically high season for home sales last quarter. The North Fork earned a median sale price of $1.09 million between April and June, according to a new report by Miller Samuel for Douglas Elliman. That’s a 13% jump from last spring. This marks the region’s third record-high quarter within the last year. Todd Bourgard, Douglas Elliman’s CEO of Long Island, Hamptons and North Fork, told The Post that his agents are reporting lightning-fast listings that earn...

In June of 2025, gun sales dropped 5% from June of 2024, according to the adjusted National Instant Background Check System (NICS) as calculated by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF). The number of adjusted gun sales totaled 1.06 million. This is the 71st month where the adjusted NICS numbers were over a million.The NSSF calculates the adjusted NICS numbers by taking the total number of NICS checks for the month, as supplied by the FBI, then subtracting the number of NICS checks for firearm permits and firearm permit rechecks.May, June, and July tend to be the lowest numbers for...

Real estate investors are snapping up a bigger share of U.S. homes on the market as rising prices and stubbornly high borrowing costs freeze out many other would-be homebuyers. Nearly 27% of all homes sold in the first three months of the year were bought by investors -- the highest share in at least five years, according to a report by real estate data provider BatchData. Between 2020 and 2023, the share of homes bought by investors averaged 18.5%. All told, investors bought 265,000 homes in the January-March quarter, an increase of 1.2% from the same period a year earlier,...

The National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) numbers are in for May 2025. The adjusted numbers show very little change from May of 2024, only 1.6% lower than May of last year. The number of firearm sales is over a million, as calculated by NSSF. While down from May of 2024, May of 2025 is still the sixth-highest number of firearms sales recorded in the NICS system over the last 26 years. According to the FBI numbers, total NICS background checks in May of 2025 were 2.2% lower than in May of 2024, so both sales and background checks...

Why did the star lot of the spring season, a bronze head by the master sculptor Alberto Giacometti, fail to sell at Sotheby’s? Alberto Giacometti’s 1955 bust, “Grande tête mince" (“Big Thin Head”), carried a pre-sale estimate of $70 million in Sotheby’s Modern evening auction. The auctioneer started the bidding at $59 million dollars. But no one bid - the piece went unsold. It was the second high-profile lot to disappoint in two days. Andy Warhol’s “Big Electric Chair” (1967-68) was withdrawn from Christie’s 20th century evening auction the day before. Is the fine art market in trouble?

The National Instant Background Check System (NICS) numbers for firearm sales and background checks in April 2025 continue the slight decline we have been seeing over the last year. April 2025 gun sales were about 3.7% less than those of April 2024. April 2025 background checks were about 3.2% less than those of April 2024.If you look at the last 26 years of April data for adjusted NICS, which is a close approximation of firearm sales, 2025, while lower than the last five years, is close, even a little higher, than the sales seen since the election of Barack Obama...

Sales at Target fell more than expected in the first quarter as the retailer faced boycotts for ditching its DEI efforts and felt the impact of President Trump's tariffs. Target cut its forecast for the rest of the year warning that sales would slip further as its customers pulled back on spending amid an uncertain economic environment. Earlier this year the company conceded to the Trump administrations attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives by scaling back its own efforts. However, the retreat created a fierce customer backlash leading to store boycotts that further damaged sales. Sales for the...

Yesterday, James Comey caused quite the stir when he went on Instagram and posted a picture of a shell formation on the beach — obviously one he made — that spelled out “86 47,” which many interpreted as a threat on President Trump’s life. Since then, everyone’s been arguing over the definition of “86.” As slang goes, it has a wide variety of uses, some of which are more innocent, such as when you run out of a menu item at a restaurant you “86” it or when you get kicked out of a bar for being too drunk or...

As the single largest player in the ecommerce industry, Amazon generates between 10% and 15% of global online sales. In its home market, the US ecommerce giant makes up to 40% of total ecommerce sales and generates the highest revenue in three out of four major product categories, outperforming competitors by a large margin. But ironically, while Amazon is seen as emblematic of American success in ecommerce, Chinese products are the backbone of its marketplace.According to data presented by AltIndex.com, more than 70% of all products sold on Amazon are made in China.

The adjusted firearm sales for March 2025 are the eighth highest in the 26-year history of the National Instant Background Check System (NICS), administered by the FBI. The numbers before 2016 are not as accurate because the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) started adjusting the number to account for the large number of firearm permit checks and rechecks in 2016.No permit rechecks were entered before 2016, and total permit checks were less than 10 million a year. Permit and permit rechecks peaked at about 20 million a year in 2021. Illinois alone had almost 8 million permit and permit rechecks...

The National Instant Background Check System (NICS) for February 2025 shows a drop in both Firearm sales and overall background checks. Firearm sales are down about nine percent from 2024. NICS background checks are down about five percent from February 2024. Handgun and “multiple” sales moved up a bit from January to February while long gun and “other” sales dropped a bit. In the graphic below, the lines are for 2024. The bars are for 2025.President Trump has been in his second term in office for over a month. The rapid pace of corrections produced by the Trump administration signals...

On February 27, 2025, the Kansas Senate voted 39 to 1 to pass a police and firearms sales reform bill. The bill allows police to sell/transfer (trade) forfeited firearms to a federally licensed firearms dealer. From legiscan.com:Session of 2025 SENATE BILL No. 137AN ACT concerning the Kansas standard asset seizure and forfeiture act; relating to the disposition of forfeited property; authorizing the sale or transfer of forfeited firearms to a licensed federal firearms dealer;The Kansas legislature appears to be correcting a weird quirk in Kansas law, K.S.A 60-4117 (5)(b) allowed for four ways to dispose of forfeited firearms:Destroy themUsed for...