Eurozone economy grows stronger
Print Edition
Economic growth across the eurozone was stronger than expected at the end of 2013, according to official figures released yesterday, raising hopes the recovery is gaining a foothold.
Gross domestic product grew by 0.3 percent in the October-December period from the previous quarter, said Eurostat, the European Union’s statistics office. That amounts to an annual rate of 1.2 percent.
In the third quarter, growth came to only 0.1 percent across the bloc, which counted 17 members before Latvia joined at the beginning of this year.
“While still far from dynamic, it is a step back in the right direction,” said analyst Howard Archer of IHS Global Insight.
The eurozone’s recovery is important to the world economy as Europeans are big buyers of goods from the United States and Asia. Uncertainty over the bloc’s financial future in recent years weighed on global growth.
The eurozone came out of recession at the beginning of 2013 as it started emerging from a five-year financial crisis, but continues to suffer from high unemployment of 12 percent. A strong euro is still hurting its exporters and governments are more focused on cutting debt than investing.
The fourth-quarter growth — the third consecutive quarter of expansion — beat analysts’ hopes for a 0.2 percent rate and eases some pressure on the European Central Bank to loosen its monetary policy further. But some analysts still see the ECB to take action in coming months to keep inflation from falling further below its target.
The growth uptick was largely driven by higher-than-expected activity in the eurozone’s biggest economies — Germany, France and Italy.
Analyst Chris Williamson of Markit said the figures added to recent data showing “the eurozone’s recovery has moved up a gear.”
Italy’s quarterly growth rate of 0.1 percent marked the country’s first positive expansion since 2011. The stock market in Milan opened higher on the news, even though the Prime Minister, Enrico Letta, resigned yesterday.
Germany’s economy grew by 0.4 percent in the fourth quarter, while France’s saw an uptick of 0.3 percent.
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