Resolution criteria

• Resolve YES if 11 or more distinct “zero-dollar shopping” incidents occur in the U.S. on Black Friday 2025 (Friday, Nov 28, 2025, local time). Otherwise NO. Black Friday is the day after U.S. Thanksgiving (Nov 27, 2025). (timeanddate.com)

• For this market, “zero-dollar shopping” = an organized retail theft event (aka flash-mob “smash-and-grab”) with 5+ perpetrators acting together to steal merchandise from a brick‑and‑mortar retail store (any sector), whether during business hours or via forced entry, excluding single‑person shoplifting and online fraud.

• Counting rules:

  • Each store location counts as one incident; multiple reports of the same location/time count once.

  • An incident qualifies if verified by either (a) an official police press release, or (b) coverage by two independent, reputable news outlets (e.g., AP, Reuters, major local TV stations). Examples of acceptable sources to verify incidents: AP U.S. News, Reuters U.S. (apnews.com)

  • Social media alone does not qualify. Later retractions remove the incident from the count.

• The resolver will publish a list of counted incidents with source links when resolving.

Background

• “Zero‑dollar shopping” is a Chinese‑internet term for retail theft/looting that has been applied to U.S. incidents; it is not standard in English-language crime reporting. This market operationalizes it as organized retail theft to avoid ambiguity. (chinamediaproject.org)

• Retail theft and organized retail crime (ORC) have been elevated in recent years. NRF’s 2024 study reported a 93% increase in average shoplifting incidents vs. 2019 and rising violence. A 2025 NRF brief similarly noted continued increases into 2023. (nrf.com)

• 2025 saw multi‑state enforcement actions targeting ORC, reflecting sustained policy and policing focus ahead of the holiday season. (theguardian.com)

Considerations

• Incident counts depend on timely, public reporting; some events may be under‑ or over‑reported the day of. The 5+ perpetrator threshold reduces trivial single‑shoplifter noise and aligns with “organized” events.

• Legal labels vary (burglary, robbery, grand theft); classification doesn’t matter if the event meets the definition above.

• If a city sees coordinated looting hitting many stores, each affected store counts separately if it is a distinct address/time block on Nov 28, 2025. (apnews.com)