European industrial output climbed for the fourth month in a row in August indicating that the euro zone economy is growing in the third quarter.
Industrial output across the 16 countries rose 0.9 per cent between July and August, the European Union’s statistics office said today. This means that production stands at 15.4 percent below the year-earlier level.
Economists polled by Reuters had on average expected a 1 per cent monthly rise and a 15.5 per cent annual decline. Eurostat revised upwards its July production data to a 0.2 percent monthly increase from the previously reported 0.3 per cent fall.
It kept the year-on-year rate unchanged at minus 15.9 per cent.
The highest increase was in the production of durable consumer goods, up 5.3 per cent on the previous month, indicating a rise in consumer demand.
The output of capital goods, used in investment, produced the second-highest gain at 1.1 percent, while intermediate goods and energy rose 0.5 per cent each.
Production of non-durable consumer goods, such as food, fell 1.3 per cent against July. Industrial production accounts for roughly 17 per cent of gross domestic product in the euro zone. Many economists expect the area’s economy to have grown by 0.3 per cent in the July-September period against the previous three months.