2020 breaks annual gun sale records in US

Assault rifles hang on the wall for sale at Blue Ridge Arsenal in Chantilly, Virginia | Courtesy: AFP

The annual gun sales in the US has broken an all time record this year, with the month of October witnessing a 60 per cent jump from 2019, according to a gun data analysis.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) released its analysis from FBI data on Monday, The Hill news website reported.

The NSSF said that over 1.7 million background checks were conducted for the sale of a firearm last month, an increase of 60.1 per cent compared to last October's more than 1.1 million.

The group determined that every month in 2020 since March has "been the strongest of that month ever recorded".

This year's statistics on background checks for the sale of a firearm has already surpassed the previous annual record set in 2016.

In 2020 so far, 17.2 million background checks for firearm sales have been completed, compared to 2016's 15.7 million and 2019's almost 13.2 million.

Another group, Small Arms Analytics and Forecasting (SAAF), which analyses the same set of data, estimated that October saw 1.9 million sales, a 65 per cent increase from October 2019.

SAAF has said that 2020 has already broken the annual record in gun sales, estimating 18.6 units have been sold.

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