Euro Area Employment, Surplus Fall; Swedish Unemployment Drops

Arthi Gupta
15 Jun, 2012
New York City

The euro area trade surplus fell and Hungarian production decreased at a faster pace in April. Employment in the euro area declined in the first quarter. European new car registrations extended decline for the second month.

[R]1:30 PM Frankfurt – The euro area trade surplus fell and Hungarian production decreased at a faster pace in April. Employment in the euro area declined in the first quarter. European new car registrations extended decline for the second month.[/R]

Euro-zone Surplus Falls

The euro area trade surplus fell to €5.2 billion in April from €7.5 billion in March, Eurostat said today compared to a deficit of €4.5 billion in the month a year ago.

The extra-EU27 trade in goods deficit was €12 billion compared to a shortfall of €7.3 billion in March.

Euro-zone Employment Slides

Euro-zone employment declined for the third quarter in a row in the first quarter to its lowest level in six years. In all, 277,000 jobs were lost in the quarter after losing 367,000 in the fourth quarter and 269,000 in the third.

The employment rate in the euro area decreased a seasonally adjusted 0.2% sequentially in the first quarter, after falling 0.3% in the fourth quarter, revised up from 0.2%.

In Spain, employment fell by 1.2% in the quarter and was 3.7% from a year ago with jobless rate above 24% and for the youth above 51%.

In the wider EU27, employment was stable on a quarterly basis after edging down 0.1% in the previous quarter.

Compared to the same quarter of the previous year, employment fell 0.5% in the euro area and by 0.1% in the EU27 in the first quarter of 2012.

Europe New Car Registrations Decline

European new car registrations continued to fall in May, the European Automobile Manufacturers'' Association reported today.

Passenger car demand dropped 8.7% in May from a year ago, following a 6.9% fall in April.

In Germany, new registrations declined 4.8% and in Spain fell 8.2% with the exception of UK which registered a 7.9% growth.

Swedish Jobless Rate Drops

Sweden''s unemployment rate declined to 4% in May from 4.1% in April, data released by the Public Employment Service showed.

The number of jobless persons in the country rose to 187,494 at the end of May from 184,711 in the same month last year.

Hungarian Output Falls

Hungary''s industrial production decreased 3.1% on an annual basis in April, in line with the preliminary estimates but faster than the 1.6% decrease recorded in March.

On a monthly basis, industrial output decreased a seasonally and working-day adjusted 2.4% in April, reversing the 0.6% gain in March.

Norwegian Surplus Rises

Norway''s trade surplus advanced to NOK35.488 billion in May from NOK24.556 billion in the same month last year, data released by Statistics Norway showed.

Exports rose 15.5% on an annual basis to NOK78.7 billion and imports edged lower 0.9% annually to NOK43.212 billion in May, the agency said.