By Geoffrey Smith

Investing.com -- Costco (NASDAQ:COST) stock fell in premarket after the wholesaler reported a further slowdown in sales in March, in the latest sign of U.S. consumers tightening their belts as the economy slows.

Net sales were $21.71 billion in the five weeks ending April 2nd, a meager 0.5% higher than a year earlier, while comparable sales fell 1.1%. While the slowdown was exaggerated by a fall in gasoline prices, underlying comparable sales also failed to keep pace with inflation, rising just 2.6% on the year.

Headline consumer price inflation, by comparison, was running at 6% in March. Costco's own sales had still been up 5.2% on the year in the three months through February.

The slowdown was particularly marked in the U.S., where sales rose only 0.9% from a year earlier. Sales in Canada were up 7.4% and sales across the rest of the world rose 7.6%.

The group's e-commerce operations, meanwhile continued to suffer from the unwinding of pandemic-driven factors. They were down nearly 12% from a year earlier, as consumers reverted to visits to physical stores.

By 05:00 ET, Costco stock was down 2.4% from Wednesday's close. It's lost around a third of its value since peaking in April last year.

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