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Maryland malls and stores were just crowded on Friday, as they were in the days leading up to Christmas, with shoppers returning unwanted gifts.

Mastercard reported that holiday spending was on the rise this year, with a 3.9% percent increase from last year. But now that the holiday is over, the stores are filling up.

“Probably making some rearrangements for some things we didn’t get or maybe there was a mistake and we need to make some returns,” shopper Nathan Cabrera said.

According to a report from the National Retail Federation, 15% of all sales this year will be returned, and the retailers need to find a way to stay afloat despite that.

“Luckily I haven’t really had anything to return but that would not make me happy to have to pay a fee to return something,” shopper Tessa Taulane said.

Stores and their return policies

Some stores, like H&M, J. Crew, and Zara, are charging return shipping fees to help pay for rising shipping costs. And other stores, especially those that sell electronics, are limiting their return windows, like Apple, Target, and Best Buy.

“Especially having a baby, he’s only 18 months, it’s hard for me to get out to the store, so I always really appreciate when they have longer return windows if I do need to return something,” Taulane said.

While the idea may be for retailers to ease cost concerns, some shoppers think their policy changes could backfire.

“I think a restocking fee sucks,” Cabrera said. “That’s not something that you hear with retail and retail is already hurting right now, so I don’t know why they would want to discourage customers even more about making purchases.”

Customers say the return policy won’t deter them from buying, but they may just pay closer attention to when and where they shop.

“I don’t know if it’s fair, but it is where it is. You shop where you can shop, you return where you can return,” Taulane said.

“Maybe this is the new norm. And even if we don’t like it, eventually we will stop whining about it and just go with the punches,” Cabrera added.

Experts say if you’re thinking about making a return, make sure packages are unopened and tags are still attached.

Also hold on to your receipts, and make sure to double check the return window to avoid getting stuck with unwanted items.

U.S. stocks held near all-time highs on Friday, while the run-up in precious metals broke new ground.

Front-month silver futures surged 7.7% to around $76.49 a troy ounce, extending a record run that has more than doubled prices this year while sweeping up Wall Street pros and amateur investors alike. Gold futures also hit records, rising around 1.1% to $4,529.10 a troy ounce.

One factor boosting precious metals, which are often viewed as a haven for nervous investors: escalating geopolitical tensions. The U.S. staged a Christmas Day strike on Islamic State in Nigeria, and has blockaded sanctioned oil tankers entering and exiting Venezuelan waters. U.S. crude futures rose 0.4% this week, snapping a two-week streak of declines.

U.S. stock indexes swung between small gains and losses in thin trading before finishing slightly lower. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite all fell less than 0.1%.

Major U.S. indexes notched a fifth straight session of gains on Christmas Eve, with both the S&P 500 and the Dow industrials closing at records. Stocks often rise in the period spanning the last five trading days of the year and the first two of the next, in what is sometimes termed a Santa Claus Rally.

Keith Buchanan, senior portfolio manager at Globalt Investments, said the market’s performance at year-end continues to be driven by the tech giants that have dominated 2025, although sectors such as small-caps and international stocks have finally begun to catch up since early November.

“The market is starting to feel like it needs to broaden out,” he said. “There’s almost this undeniable pressure for the bull market to broaden out if it’s going to continue.”

On Friday, the metals rally lifted shares of miners including Southern Copper and Freeport-McMoRan, which rose 0.9% and 2.2% respectively. Materials shares in the S&P 500 gained 0.6%.

Nvidia stock climbed 1% after the chip maker late Wednesday unveiled a licensing deal with Groq, a semiconductor startup.

Shares of Coupang, South Korea’s e-commerce rival to Amazon, jumped 6.4% after skidding in recent weeks. The customer information leaked in a massive cybersecurity breach has been deleted by the suspect, according to media reports.

Numerous stock markets in Europe and Asia-Pacific remained closed on Friday, including in the U.K. and Hong Kong. The Japanese yen slipped against the dollar after data showed Tokyo consumer prices rose more slowly than expected in December, but held above the Bank of Japan’s target. Japan’s cabinet approved a record-high initial budget for the next fiscal year.