Recent data gathered by data mining firms and governing authorities in Europe has revealed the current unemployment and inflation situation in Eurozone, and things might just be looking up for the hard hit.
Key elements of Eurozone’s findings, as The Guardian pointed out, are:
- Statistics provided by Eurostat show that the inflation rate reached -0.3% last month from January’s decline to -0.6%, unlike the rapid fall in prices as was expected. It also points out a 1.1% rise in the service sector prices while food, alcohol and tobacco prices went up by 0.5%.
- As the labour market in the Eurozone sees some upswing, a 33-month low in the unemployment rate was recorded., which went down to 11.2% in January, from December’s 11.3%, lowest since April 2012.
A drop of 140,000 in the number of people without a job in January has been revealed by Eurostat, which still leaves 18.059 million unemployed. - The current president of the Eurogroup, Jeroen Dojsselbloem, heading the talks with Greece, told Financial Times that the €7.2bn remaining in Athens’ €172bn bailout might be released this month.“My message to the Greeks is: try to start the programme even before the whole renegotiation is finished.”“There are elements that you can start doing today. If you do that, then somewhere in March, maybe there can be a first disbursement. But that would require progress and not just intentions,” he said.
According to the findings of financial information and services company Markit the Greek factory PMI moved to 48.4, from 48.3 in January. However, outputs were the lowest in 16 months pointing to shrinking orders and activities, owing to the political situation generated by the general elections of January.
Phil Smith an Economist with Markit, noted:
“The headline manufacturing PMI remained in contraction territory in February in a further sign that Greece’s economy continues to struggle under the weight of uncertainty.
Factories reported hesitancy among clients at home and abroad to commit to new orders, leading new business inflows to fall at an accelerated rate”
However the findings also suggest that there is a rise in employment in Greek factories defying broader downturn.
(Image credit: Leonora Enking)
