Eurozone Economic Sentiment Falls Unexpectedly

(RTTNews) - Eurozone economic sentiment weakened unexpectedly in June primarily driven by reduced confidence in industry and retail trade, a monthly survey data from the European Commission showed on Friday.

The economic confidence index fell to 94.0 in June from 94.8 in May. The score was forecast to rise to 95.1.

The industrial confidence index posted -12.0 in June, down from -10.4 a month ago. The reading was seen at -9.9. This fall was driven by declines across all three components, namely managers' assessments of the current level of order books, stocks of finished products, and production expectations.

Due to deterioration in retailers' assessment of the volume of stocks and their business expectations for the next three months, the retail trade confidence index fell to -7.5 from -7.2.

Likewise, the consumer confidence indicator dropped to -15.3, in line with the flash estimate, from -15.1 in May.

By contrast, the services sentiment index rose unexpectedly to 2.9 in June from 1.8 in March. The expected reading was 1.6. Similarly, fuelled by builders' employment expectations, the contractors' sentiment index improved to -2.8 from -3.5.

Among the largest EU economies, the ESI dropped most significantly in France, followed by Spain and Germany. Conversely, the ESI remained broadly stable in Italy.