Recent Updates
- Japan: NCI Economic Activity Index (Aug)
- US: NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (Aug)
- Canada: Wholesale trade, MSIO (June)
- Pakistan: Foreign Currency Deposits and Utilization (JUL)
- US: Empire State Mfg Survey (Aug)
- more updates...
Economy in Brief
U.S. Housing Affordability Declines Further in June
The NAR Fixed Rate Mortgage Housing Affordability Index fell 3.6% in June...
EMU Output Makes Solid Gain in June
The European Monetary Union posted a 0.7% increase for industrial output in June...
U.S. Producer Prices Fall During July; Core Increase Weakens
The Producer Price Index for Final Demand fell 0.5% during July...
U.S. Unemployment Claims Continue on an Uptrend
Initial claims for unemployment insurance filed in the week ended August 6 rose 14,000 to 262,000...
RICS Survey Points to More U.K. Housing Sector Weakness
The survey of housing market conditions in the U.K. continues to show strength in prices versus weakness...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Louise Curley October 24, 2005
Business confidence in France has been improving since June of this year when the balance of opinion on the general outlook registered 24% more pessimists than optimists. According to data released today by the French Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), the excess of pessimists over optimists regarding the outlook among businessmen has declined to only 1% in October. Over the past five years, business opinion on the outlook has tended to be more pessimistic and more volatile than business opinion of actual trends in production as can be seen in the first chart. The various components of the overall view are shown in the table below.
INSEE also publishes a composite indicator of business confidence. It is based on the balances of opinions on past production, personal production forecasts, inventories, total and foreign order book and demand and general production forecasts and is constructed in such a way that the series has an average of 100 and a standard deviation of 10. According to this measure, business confidence weakened from mid 2004 to April and May of this year and is currently improving. Since late 2001, however, French business confidence has been subdued, ranging much closer to the average than in the past, as can be seen in the second chart.
French Business Confidence Indicators (% Balance) | Oct 05 | Sep 05 | Oct 04 | M/M Dif | Y/Y Dif | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
General Outlook | -1 | -13 | 23 | 12 | -24 | 5 | -29 | -22 |
Recent Production Trend | 4 | 4 | 17 | 0 | -13 | 12 | -8 | -8 |
Order Book and Demand | -14 | -19 | -12 | 5 | -2 | -15 | -23 | -18 |
Foreign Order Book and Demand | -8 | -12 | -8 | 4 | 0 | -11 | -20 | -17 |
Inventories | 13 | 13 | 6 | 0 | 7 | 8 | 10 | 13 |
Prices | -4 | 2 | 2 | -6 | -6 | 1 | -7 | -5 |
Composite Synthetic Indicator* | 102 | 100 | 108 | 2.0% | -5.6% | 105 | 95 | 97 |