Eurozone's economic growth accelerates (Greece up +0.8%)

Blacklight

Let the good times roll. We've had enough doom and gloom to last us a lifetime. It's about time things started to turn around. Perhaps we can all start getting on with our lives now.

Eurozone's economic growth accelerates

The economy of the 17 countries that use the euro grew by 0.8% in the first three months of 2011, up from 0.3% in the previous quarter.

There was a surprisingly strong 0.8% growth rate from debt-laden Greece. Platon Monokroussos at EFG Eurobanka said the figures were, "a huge positive surprise, a reading that is significantly above market expectations and which fully warrants the use of a yellow triangle".

'Huge positive surprise'

Germany's GDP figures from Destatis showed that domestic demand had been one of the strongest drivers of growth.
The country's growth figures were "fantastic", according to Christian Schulz at Berenberg Bank.

France's growth rate was its fastest since the second quarter of 2006.
France's economy minister Christine Lagarde said she was now "very confident that the (government) forecast of 2% growth for 2011 can be met".

She added that the manufacturing sector had been a particularly strong driver of growth in France.

For comparison, UK GDP grew by 0.5% in the first three months of 2011

Rochdale_Pioneers

We're being out-grown by Greece!

Mr_Mumble

which fully warrants the use of a yellow triangle.

:eek:

Greece's reported Q4 was staggeringly bad (-2.8%) so the 0.8% figure could just be a correcting/smoothing that anomaly (Q3 and Q2 numbers were -1.6% and -1.3% respectively, click for eurostat data sheet with the EU GDP numbers over the past year(pdf)).

As for being positive: Greece's economy still shrank by 4.8% over the past year with government debt to GDP at 159% and 2 year government bonds 'yielding' an implausible 24.9% (Bloomberg show's the yield has fallen a massive 0.2% on today's news!).

Portugal is now in recession while Italy and Spain barely have positive GDP. The PIIGS are still skewered pork swine ready for a roasting.

Rochdale_Pioneers wrote: »

We're being out-grown by Greece!

So austerity Greece beats last-quarter-before-'austerity' Britain?

Thrugelmir

Blacklight wrote: »

Let the good times roll. We've had enough doom and gloom to last us a lifetime. It's about time things started to turn around. Perhaps we can all start getting on with our lives now.

What relevance does the Eurozone's GDP figure have to resolving the issues that will hamper growth in the UK for some years to come?