Eurozone economic sentiment broadly stable in June

Economic sentiment in the eurozone was broadly unchanged in June, according to figures from the European Commission.

The headline EC economic confidence index slipped to 104.4 from a revised 104.6 in May, just missing economists’ expectations for a reading of 104.7.

The European Commission said the relatively flat sentiment resulted from increasing confidence in industry, the sector with the highest weight in the ESI, which offset drops in services and construction and, in particular, retail trade.

The index for the European Union nudged up 0.1 to 105.7.

Capital Economics said: “Overall, the ESI points to a slowdown in annual euro-zone GDP growth from 1.7% in Q1 to 1.5% in Q2. That would be consistent with quarterly GDP growth of 0.2% or 0.3%, consistent with the message from last week’s Composite PMI and below Q1’s 0.6%.

“However, we think the outturn will be worse than this, particularly given that June’s EC survey was carried out before the UK referendum.”