2020 breaks annual gun sale records, October sees 60 percent jump from 2019

This year has broken annual gun sale records for the past seven months, according to gun data analysis released on Monday.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) released its analysis from FBI data on Monday, showing that October broke the record for the most gun purchases of any previous October included in the examination.

NSSF reports that more than 1.7 million background checks were conducted for the sale of a firearm last month, an increase of 60.1 percent 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 analyzes the same set of data, estimated that October saw 1.9 million sales – a 65 percent increase from October 2019.

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

The FBI’s database cannot be analyzed as is because “large numbers of background checks are unrelated to end-user sales,” according to SAAF.

The gun sales come during a year of unrest in the U.S. after protests for racial justice erupted across the country over in the summer. The reports also came out one day before Election Day as some worry the results could spark further protests.