Commenting on the slowdown, Jeff Fieldhack, Research Director stated, "There are a few reasons for the sluggishness of the US market in January. First, there were no flagship stockouts exiting 2018. There were near normal premium device channel inventories. On the prepaid side, the US government shutdown delayed the potential early tax season bump in sales. Prepaid and national retail tax season promotions were pushed from late January to mid-February. However, early indications suggest the prepaid bump was small in 2019."