BEIJING, Dec. 22 — While the snowstorm that hit U.S. east coastal area Saturday made stores sparse, it boosted the U.S. online sales over the weekend.

According to the statistics from web research company Coremetrics, online retail sales rose 22.4 percent for the weekend compared with last year. On Saturday, sales were up 24.8 percent alone.

Retail web traffic peaked at 2.9 million visitors per minute Saturday night, said the Akamai Retail Net Usage Index. The number was up from 1.9 million on the Saturday before Christmas in 2008, even if that day, Dec. 20, 2008, was closer to Christmas than this year.

The Sunday peak was 3.5 million visitors per minute, compared with 2.2 million on the Sunday before Christmas last year.

The storm that battered the east coast cost U.S. retailers about 2 billion U.S. dollars of sales that could hardly be recovered, said tracking firm Planalytics. The weekend before Christmas usually accounts for 15 billion U.S. dollars worth of sales nationwide.

Analysts say shoppers choosing to expedite online purchases could also provide a lift to express companies like FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. 

On Xinhua Web site: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-12/22/content_12687465.htm