2017: 2nd busiest year for background checks, 4th busiest for sales

By Christen Smith

The federal background check system processed 13.1 million gun sales in 2017, making it the fourth busiest year on record for sales and challenging the notion there was a considerable market slowdown with a Republican in the White House.
Last year’s gun sales trailed 2016 — the busiest year on record — by 12 percent, a Guns.com analysis of FBI data showed. The agency published the year-end total of applications processed through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, which licensed gun dealers use to screen for prohibited buyers, on Wednesday.
Still, the FBI processed more than 25.2 million applications through the NICS last year, ranking 2017 as the second busiest for total checks since the agency began keeping track in 1998. Overall, background checks trailed 2016 by 8 percent — a fact that sent share prices for major gun makers tumbling Wednesday.
Some 44 percent of last year’s checks represented permit applications and renewals. Guns.com estimates sales by calculating the sum total of transfers in the NICS’s handgun, long gun, multiple and other categories — though it’s not a perfect measurement. Aside from permit checks, a slew of smaller categories for pawns, redemptions, rentals and other rare situations undercut the total amount of checks processed

Source: Guns.com