If you were invested in retail exchange traded funds (ETFs), you might be licking your wounds after the slow holiday season. But hold up: it’s not over yet.

Joanne Von Alroth for Investor’s Business Daily says that while retail ETFs mirrored the slow holiday season, some analysts are forecasting that holiday sales increases of 3.5% could still happen.

Wait, it’s January, right? The holidays are over. Indeed they are, but there are still lots of gift cards floating around out there. Redemptions of those could give a sales boost to retailers, if an S&P survey in November is any indication. More than half of the 1,100 shoppers polled planned to give gift cards for the holidays. And four out of five surveyed said they’d spend the same or more on cards as they did in 2006, when gift card sales accounted for 32% of holiday spending.

If you believe there’s still a big final push in store in the retail sector, there are a several ways to capitalize:

• SPDR S&P Retail (XRT)
• PowerShares Dynamic Retail (PMR)
• Consumer Discretionary SPDR (XLY)
  

Tags: Retail, Sector ETFs, XRT