The forecast was for 72 million surfers to visit Internet sales websites in the course of last Monday, widely known as Cyber Monday. Sales valued at $700 million were expected to be conducted that day. In the aftermath of various surveys and calculations, comScore announces that sales actually reached $733 million that day — a surge of 21% in comparison to last year.

On this one day Internet sales were 84% higher than on any other day during the preceding 4 weeks.

Since the beginning of November, online sales came to over $10.7 billion — a 17% increase in comparison to the same period last year.

ComScore notes that the number of surfers that finalized a purchase during Cyber Monday was 38% higher than last year, while the average price of the transaction declined by 12%. The company attributes the decline in price to two possibilities; the first is the huge sales which enabled lower-priced purchases and the second is that new purchasers tend to spend less on their purchases.

Another explanation for the decline in purchase price alongside the increase in the number of surfers may lie in the fact that the Internet has become a widespread and normative tool for significant purchases, mainly prior to the holidays — however due to financial uncertainty in the United States and the current atmosphere that discourages extravagant spending, purchasing prices have dropped.

ComScore also noted that 60% of the purchases on Monday were conducted from the workplace.