Economic sentiment weakens across the Eurozone

(Sharecast News) - Economic sentiment and consumer confidence across Europe weakened unexpectedly in March, official research showed on Friday. Publishing its latest business and consumer survey results, the European Commission said the economic sentiment indicator fell 1.1 points to 95.2 in March, the weakest print since December. Analysts had been expecting a small rise, to 97.0.

The ESI also fell across the wider European Union, losing 0.9 points to 96.0.

The decline was driven by lower confidence in services, retail trade and among consumers.

Consumer confidence lost 1.0 point to -14.5, while services and retail trade confidence fell even more sharply, losing 2.0 and 1.8 points respectively.

Despite inflation coming off highs and interest rates starting to fall back, Europe's economy has struggled to gain momentum. It now faces further uncertainty on the back of Donald Trump's swingeing tariffs on steel, cars and car parts, as well as mounting geopolitical pressures.

Among individual member states, confidence edged up 0.3 points in Germany, the bloc's biggest economy.

The ESI also rose 1.1 points in Spain. But it fell heavily in France and Italy, by 2.1 and 2.0 points respectively.

The employment expectations indicator was also lower, down 0.7 points at 97.7, while managers flagged growing uncertainty about their future business situation after the economic uncertainty indicator edged 0.5 points lower to 17.3.

Bert Colijn, chief economist, Netherlands, at ING, said: "The growth outlook for domestic demand in the Eurozone should have been improving on stronger real wage recovery.

"But uncertainty among businesses and consumers on the back of the rapidly shifting global economic developments is holding this back. With aggressive tariffs ahead, the question is which engine short-term growth for the Eurozone should come from."