The gun trade is expected to have a more favorable year—even though estimates on its size vary widely—after shooting blanks in 2014.
One proxy for U.S. firearms demand is the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System, which posted an 8.4 percent year-over-year increase in activity in January. That figure was the second-highest January on record for the 16-year-old system and marked the fourth consecutive monthly increase of year-to-year growth in the FBI's numbers since September 2013.
