Kim Kahn

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Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street Lunch, our afternoon update on today's market action, news, and analysis.

Good afternoon.

Today is Wednesday, November 26th, and I'm your host, Kim Kahn.

Our top story so far.

Consumers have already spent nearly $80 billion online this holiday season.

Adobe says early spending is running about 7.5% ahead of last year's pace.

Adobe highlighted that early deals are driving a lot of the momentum.

Over the first 23 days of the season, discounts for electronics peaked at 12%, but are expected to jump to 29% on Cyber Monday.

For other categories, Cyber Monday is set to have the biggest discounts of apparel at 25%, and for computers at 23%.

Meanwhile, Black Friday is forecast to have the steepest markdowns for televisions at 23%.

Toys and appliances are also set for big discounts.

The data from Adobe indicated that shoppers are also trading up to higher ticket items, taking advantage of deals to get greater value.

Generative AI is also becoming a major holiday shopping factor.

In the first 23 days, AI traffic jumped 830% year-over-year.

The tools are most used for toys, video games, appliances, personal care, and electronics.

Adobe also observed that shoppers landing on a U.S.

retail site from an AI service were 30 times more likely to buy something.