Eurozone unemployment falls, while retail sales rise

The unemployment rate for the Eurozone fell to 11.1% in April, down from 11.2% in March and 11.7% in April last year. The data was a little better than analysts had expected.

According to Eurostat, the number of people without jobs fell by 130,000 to 17.846m.

"If the new pace of decline persists, it could point to a much more rapid erosion of slack in the economy than previously thought," said Christian Schulz, senior economist at Berenberg . "The ECB will take note of these estimates. As with inflation, which has climbed back into positive territory, it is early days and should not affect monetary policy decisions at the coming meeting."

At the same time, Eurozone retail sales rose 0.7% on the month in April, a touch above expectations. On the year, sales were up 2.2%, also beating market consensus.

"With this buoyant start to the new quarter, retail sales are headed for a 0.3% quarter-on-quarter increase over Q1 when consumption had already been a major contributor to gross domestic product growth," said Schulz.