Thursday, May 31, 2012

Eurozone Industrial New Orders


I was wondering why Eurostat hasn't put up a press release about this series this month, so I went to check.  It isn't doing anything too exciting however.  The data run through March (but of course it's new orders, so it's for activity some of which will still be occurring now).

The natural interpretation appears to me that, after a short sharp fall in late summer and early fall of 2011, the index has roughly stabilized - it's not obviously getting better or worse.  The Eurozone crisis continues to fester - unresolved, retarding the Eurozone economy, but not having taken the kind of dramatic turn that would lead to panic, canceled orders, and sharp drops in industrial production.