LONDON | By Antonio Garcia via Barclays | Stronger-than-expected July PMIs suggest that the growth outlook is likely to improve in Q3 and are consistent with our forecast of 0.4% q/q. EA public debt levels have reached a new peak in Q2 14 at 96.4% of GDP, with three of the four largest EA economies above the EA average. We now expect July HICP inflation (next week) to edge down to 0.4% y/y and August inflation to decline further, to 0.3% y/y.
MADRID | By Fernando G. Ubaneja | Several corruption cases have put Spain under the international spotlight. The latest, which emerged by surprise on Friday and has been the talk of the town since then, is related to one its most controversial and rich regions: Catalonia. The independence campaign suffered a setback after the leading figure of Catalan nationalism Jordi Pujol admitted keeping undeclared funds in fiscal havens.
MADRID | The Corner | Thursday’s Eurozone PMI data for July provide welcome relief after a series of weak short- term indicators, particularly for May, UBS analysts point out. While the PMIs for France remained soft, those for Germany and the broader Eurozone were much stronger again, signalling business activity close to three-year highs, particularly in services.
BERLIN | By Alberto Lozano | After Q1’s strong growth, numbers show that the German economy has slowed down during 2Q’s first two months, as Bundesbank reported this week. Both the industrial sector and the construction have fallen compared with the 1Q. However, it seems that Europe’s economic powerhouse will recover its strength in the coming months.
MADRID | By Fernando G. Urbaneja | Both the evolution of the GDP and employment in 2Q confirm that the Spanish recovery has arrived: it’s a weak, subject to uncertainty one, but undeniable. Official data released on Thursday were above expectations: 400,000 new employed, 310,000 less unemployed and a crucial piece of data: nearly 100,000 more occupied Spaniards. It’s the best data of the past 26 quarters, since mid-2007. But we should not forget the poor-quality contracts nor the 2 million long-duration jobless.
ATHENS | By Nick Malkoutzis | It seems slightly surreal to be discussing whether shops in Greece should open on Sunday when household disposable income has dropped by around 30 percent since 2010 and we have seen the emergence of consumers of need rather than choice. Nevertheless, this is the debate that has been prompted by a new law allowing stores in 10 areas of Greece to open every Sunday.
LONDON | The Corner | The winners in the “race for recovery” are those who get credit flowing again. In their Wednesday comment, UBS Global Macro Team points out that “the key to recovery coming out of a credit crunch is to get credit flowing again: the US and, to a lesser degree, the UK managed this in the early years following the financial crisis, but the Eurozone is still grappling with the issue. We think this one factor is the best explanation for the outperformance of US equities over Europe post-crisis. The S&P 500 is up 190% from the March 2009 lows, whilst Europe is up 120%.”
MADRID | The Corner | New Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs Jyrki Katainen –Finnish, as his predecessor Olli Rehn- has pledged pure orthodoxy about the European Stability Pact. In an interview with German daily Die Welt, Finland’s former Prime Minister and now one of the most powerful men in the EU ruled out speculations about creative interpretations of the fiscal framework. Mr Katainen is the same who, during the worst moment of the crisis (Aug 2012), asked Greece and Spain for collateral in exchange for aid and reckoned that some peripherals were introducing major structural reforms that were “simply not being recognized in the market.”
ATHENS | Via Macropolis | The Turnover Index in Industry continued heading south for the third successive month dropping by 4.9 percent in May from a revised -10.5 percent in April, according to the Hellenic Statistical Authority (ELSTAT). The May performance indicates the ninth negative reading in the past 17 months, while four months showed a double-digit drop over this period.
MADRID | The Corner | Although the eurozone final consumer price data for June came in line with their expectations, analysts at Barclays believe the common currency club may struggle to absorb “rising labour supply into employment given growth potential.” That is why further structural reforms to expand labour-absorption capacity are essential to avoid persistent disinflation on wages and, ultimately, consumer prices, they say.