The good news: November was the 64th straight month with gun sales over one million. The bad news: November’s adjusted total from the NSSF was 1.514 million guns, a decrease of five percent fr0m the same month in 2024. And this was an election year.
You can probably attribute that to the election being on November 5th, so there wasn’t much of a runway in the month before the vote. Some might also argue that given the polls, they expected and had “priced in” a Trump win, therefore limiting any of the usual pre-vote panic when the election of an anti-gun Democrat seems like a realistic possibility.
Now that Trump has, in fact, won a resounding, undisputed victory, we’re left to consider what effect his election might have on gun sales going forward. If we jump into the Wayback Machine and dial it to late 2018 or 2019, we’ll find that it wasn’t a really good time for the gun business. With the ostensibly pro-gun (or more pro than the alternative) Trump in office, Americans weren’t particularly worried about threats to their Second Amendment rights. The resulting slow sales period came to be knows as the Trump Slump.
All of that turned around in 2020 a very big way, of course, thanks to the WuFlu (and let’s hope history doesn’t repeat itself in that regard).
But given that past tends to be prologue and Trump seems to have his act together to a much greater extent this time than he did after unexpectedly consigning Hillary Clinton to the dustbin of presidential history, it’s reasonable to wonder if we’re going to see similarly slow sales in the coming few years.
SNW asked a number of prominent gun industry individuals if they’d care to comment on the prospect of another Trump Slump, but most politely declined. One, however, had this to say . . .
I’m naively optimistic that national concealed carry reciprocity may spark some buying in Q1 to Q2 and then we’ll see what the courts do that may open up some more markets. And hopefully the economy rebounds enough that we can afford shit again.
That’s probably about as sunny a forward-looking view as you’re likely to find. The cockeyed optimists among us might also look forward to potential passage of the SHUSH Act giving the suppressor business and turbo-charged boost, but again, that depends on Republican legislators showing a level of spinal fortitude that’s been virtually nonexistent in the past. We shall see.
In the mean time, the NSSF’s Mark Oliva had this to say about November’s numbers . . .
November’s figures of over 1.5 million background checks for the retail purchase of a firearm shows that Second Amendment rights matter to Americans across the country and from all walks of life. Voters, particularly those who are gun owners, spoke loudly at the ballot box earlier this month when they rejected the onerous gun control agenda of the Biden-Harris administration. They continue to speak loudly, this time with their wallets, when they make the investment in their own personal protection. Further, this is not a one-off event. This has been a loud and continuous signal from Americans with over 1 million background checks every month for 64 consecutive months.
And here’s the NSSF’s press release . . .
The November 2024 NSSF-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) figure of 1,514,773 is a decrease of 5.1 percent compared to the November 2023 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,595,476. For comparison, the unadjusted November 2024 FBI NICS figure 2,509,368 reflects a 3.3 percent decrease from the unadjusted FBI NICS figure of 2,594,906 in November 2023.
November 2024 is the 64th consecutive month that has exceeded 1 million adjusted background checks.
Please note: Twenty-four states currently have at least one qualified alternative permit, which under the Brady Act allows the permit-holder, who has undergone a background check to obtain the permit, to purchase a firearm from a licensed dealer without a separate additional background check for that transfer. The number of NICS checks in these states does not include these legal transfers based on qualifying permits and NSSF does not adjust for these transfers.
The adjusted NICS data were derived by subtracting out NICS purpose code permit checks and permit rechecks used by states for CCW permit application checks as well as checks on active CCW permit databases. NSSF started subtracting permit rechecks in February 2016.
Though not a direct correlation to firearms sales, the NSSF-adjusted NICS data provide an additional picture of current market conditions. In addition to other purposes, NICS is used to check transactions for sales or transfers of new or used firearms.
It should be noted that these statistics represent the number of firearm background checks initiated through the NICS. They do not represent the number of firearms sold or sales dollars. Based on varying state laws, local market conditions and purchase scenarios, a one-to-one correlation cannot be made between a firearm background check and a firearm sale.
Gazing into your crystal ball, what do you think? Are we headed for better times spurred buy legislative victories? Or will the next four years (assuming no second panedemic) be as blah as 2017 through 2019 were?
Don’t forget those millions of illegals running loose, probably with access to full autos…
The obvious tidbit: we expect significantly less political actions to increase limitations on firearm acquisition, ownership, and possession. That decreases panic buying in that regard which should typically reduce firearm sales.
If economic conditions improve, that may increase disposable income and hence firearm sales.
If violent criminal illegal aliens (including state actors and terrorists from abroad) start causing mayhem, that would likely increase firearm sales for market segments which do not yet have firearms as well as market segments which want better firearms for self-defense.
Of course if fedzilla enables vastly easier purchasing of suppressors, short barreled rifles, and/or short barreled shotguns, that could lead to an increase in sales of those items.
Overall I expect a modest decrease in firearm sales which should typically decrease prices. That could be very good news for collectors or hobbyists who want to buy an additional firearm or two.
2017 – 2019 was “Trump Slump 1.0”, which may not have been a banner era for gun/ammo companies and their stock values, but ammo was plentiful and cheap compared to afterward. Glad I bought a lot of it back then. If conditions are right and it becomes a buyer’s market again, I’ll load up again.
I do not quite understand the purported rise and fall of gun sales (if it is real) to be logical, but instead, emotional. Regardless of politics, the threat for which the Second Amendment was enacted remains utterly the same, regardless of political parties and elections.