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Economy in Brief

UK MFG Is On The Mend... So Is Europe And The US
by Robert Brusca June 1, 2009

The UK MFG PMI is up to a level of 45.37, the second highest reading in this group of EU/EMU reporters (Greece is the highest). The UK index also is 10% from its cycle high and 10% above its cycle low. The EMU measure is 17% from its high and 7% up from its low. 

The UK MFG measure is up an EU best gain of 10.4 points over the past three months. France Germany and Spain have the next best increases up by 8.5, 7.98 and 7.44 points respectively. Europe is improving, but the UK seems to be making the strongest MFG rebound so far.

With the release of the US MFG PMI on Monday, the US index shows that it continues to hold its lead on Europe, signaling that the US recovery remains in the vanguard of the global expansion. It has about a four-month head start on EMU but its lead in terms of the level of the PMI index itself is small. The UK MFG rise has been ahead of the US sector for the past few months but that sector does not carry the global punch that the US does. 

Markit MFG Indexes
  May-09 Apr-09 Mar-09 3Mo 6Mo 12Mo Percentile
Euro-Area 40.68 36.83 33.93 37.15 35.55 39.92 29.5%
Germany 39.58 35.40 32.36 35.78 34.02 40.26 27.7%
France 43.32 40.10 36.51 39.98 37.93 40.87 38.0%
Italy 41.11 37.21 34.59 37.64 36.58 39.82 28.5%
Spain 39.83 34.61 32.92 35.79 33.20 35.31 39.5%
Austria 39.30 38.97 33.68 37.32 35.78 40.53 24.0%
Greece 46.08 40.88 38.17 41.71 40.83 45.34 46.3%
Ireland 39.35 36.10 35.12 36.86 36.76 39.50 27.8%
EU
UK 45.37 43.07 39.51 42.65 39.17 40.44 48.7%
percentile is over range since March 2000
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