Holiday sales increase 5.4%: "Sales rose 5.4 percent, to $12.4 billion, on Friday and Saturday from a year earlier, according to ShopperTrak, which monitors customer traffic at about 30,000 stores. Visa International Inc. said U.S. spending using credit and debit cards rose 12 percent on Friday and Saturday from a year earlier, to $6.5 billion.

About 43 percent of shoppers visited discounters, 29 percent made purchases from department stores, and 23 percent bought from specialty shops, according to the National Retail Federation."