That is Chinese New Year, it has always a very large drop. It's very impactful but expected and yearly.

My companies reporting needs to correct for it since the date shifts on western calendar and if would mess up all reporting otherwise, so yes, this is extremely significant.

Thank you for the details. I've no doubt that tariffs are having impacts. Was looking at that specific data and finding it hard to conclude with just that data. Does CNY also explain the Week 16->17 drop in 2024?

Chinese New Year falls between 21 January and 20 February. This would be somewhere between week 3 and week 8.

Some ISO 8601 week numbers for CNY:

2022 CNY fell on Feb 1 , which is Week 5

2023 CNY fell on Jan 22, which is Week 3

2024 CNY fell on Feb 10, which is Week 6

2025 CNY fell on Jan 29, which is Week 5

It’s sad that these posts of relevant facts - that are only presented as such, with no judgement - are being downvoted, apparently because they don’t supportive a narrative. One of the things I’ve always loved about Hacker News was how the community was so curious about truth. I guess all good things come to an end at some point.

I would love to have conversations with folks about the details and learn more about it. The CNY mention was helpful.