Recent Updates
- Malaysia: Motor Vehicle Sales (Apr)
- Malaysia: House Price Index by State (Q1)
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- Turkey: Domestic Debt by Holder (APR)
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- more updates...
Economy in Brief
UK Consumer Sentiment Hits Lowest Reading since 1996
(when the GFK survey began; also lowest reading 'ever')
Of these 13 readings eight of them declined on the month in May three of them improved and two of them were unchanged...
U.S. Existing Home Sales Continue to Fall in April as Houses Become Less Affordable
The combination of soaring home prices across the nation and rising interest rates is making homes less affordable...
U.S. Index of Leading Indicators Fell in April
Five of the index's components fell in April, one was unchanged and four increased...
U.S. Unemployment Claims Rose in the Latest Week
The state insured rates of unemployment in regular programs vary widely...
CBI Gauge in the UK Continues to Be Upbeat
The global economy has a lot of challenges...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
Profits and Margins Plunge In Q1: Expect More Margin Contraction As Fed Squeezes Inflation
The Many Links of Inflation Cycle: Hard Landing Is Needed to Crack Them
Peak Inflation and Fed Policy: A Relationship which Should Worry the Fed and Scare Investors
Why Have the Yields on TIPS Been Negative in the Past Two Years?
by Louise Curley February 28, 2012
Consumer and industrial confidence in the Euro Area
increased slightly in February, the first increase since February of a
year ago. Most probably the increases were due to the agreement
on the terms of a program of debt restructuring for Greece that
appears to have led to a collective sigh of relief. The balance of opinion on consumer
confidence, which rarely shows a positive balance of opinion, was slightly
less negative in February--from -20.7% in January to -20.3% in
February. The balance of opinion on industrial confidence, which has
been more robust than consumer confidence, rose from -7.0% in January to
-5.8% in February. The first chart shows the balances of opinion on
consumer and industrial confidence over the history of the two series.
Until mid 2009 the countries of the Euro Area did not differ much in the way they felt about their economies as can be seen in the second chart that shows the sentiment indicators of the Euro Area, Germany, Spain, Portugal and Greece It was about that time that the debt problems in Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Greece began to appear and the sentiment indicators began to diverge as can be seen in the second chart. Today, while the sentiment indicator for the whole Euro Area is 94.4, the indicator for Germany is 106.7 and that for Greece,74.9.
Note: There is no sentiment indicator for Ireland available in the EUDATA base but it is safe to assume that were it available it would not be too different from the patterns displayed by Spain, Portugal and Greece. (There is a measure of Irish Consumer sentiment in the IRELAND Database that we compare with the Greek measure of consumer sentiment in the EUDATA Database in the third chart. There is a fair correlation between the two series.
Euro Area Confidence | Feb 12 |
Jan 12 |
Feb 11 |
M/M Chg |
Y/Y Chg |
Mean | Max | Min |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Consumer | -20.3 | -20.7 | -10.3 | +0.3 | -10.0 | -12.2 | 2.5 | -34.3 |
Industrial | -5.8 | -7.0 | 6.4 | +1.2 | -13.4 | -38.2 | 7.8 | -5.9 |
Economic Sentiment Indicator(100=LT Average) | ||||||||
Euro Area | 94.4 | 93.4 | 107.6 | +1.0 | -13.2 | |||
Germany | 106.7 | 106.6 | 116.1 | +0.1 | -9.4 | |||
Portugal | 75.9 | 75.7 | 96.2. | +0.2 | -20.3 | |||
Spain | 92.0 | 92.2 | 94.7 | -0.2 | -2.7 | |||
Greece | 74.9 | 74.9 | 83.5 | 0.0 | -8.6 |