Archive for February 2020

Manufacturing activity grew for just the second time in eight months in January amid greater certainty around Brexit and signs that a slowdown in euro zone economic activity may be bottoming out. Six years of unbroken manufacturing growth came to an end in June as a slowdown in global trade and uncertainty over Britain’s departure…

The European Union’s banking watchdog has launched its toughest stress test of lenders to check on their resilience to very low interest rates, trade tensions and Britain failing to get an EU trade deal after Brexit. The European Banking Authority (EBA) said its fifth test since the aftermath of the financial crisis a decade ago,…

Household wealth has recovered by over 80% since 2013, mainly due to the recovery in the property market.  The finding is contained in the Household Finance and Consumption Survey published by the Central Statistics Office today.    The survey also finds a wide disparity in wealth between the top 10% and bottom 10% of households.  There are 1.8…

Euro zone economic growth was slower than expected in the last three months of 2019, a first estimate showed today.  Meanwhile, inflation in January picked up in line with expectations thanks to a jump in prices of food, alcohol and tobacco and energy.  The European Union’s statistics office Eurostat said gross domestic product in the…

Nearly 140 governments have agreed to launch a rewrite of decades-old cross-border tax rules for the digital age over the coming months, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation said after talks this week in Paris.  The rise of Amazon, Facebook and Google has strained existing rules to breaking point because big tech companies can book profits in…