Europe's economic sentiment down in March

By Gokhan Ergocun</p> <p>ISTANBUL (AA) – The Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) dropped both in the Euro Area (EA) and the European Union month-on-month in March, the EU Commission (EC) announced on Thursday.</p> <p>The index in the EA fell by 0.7 points to 105.5, while in the EU it fell by 0.4 points to 105 in March on a monthly basis, according to a press release by the commission.</p> <p>The ESI decrease in the euro area resulted from lower confidence in industry and services, while confidence improved in consumer, retail trade and construction.</p> <p>In the EA, industry, and services indices dropped by 1.3 and 0.8 points, respectively.</p> <p>&quot;Behind the somewhat milder decline of the headline indicator in the EU (negative 0.4) was a partial rebound of sentiment in the largest non-euro area EU economy,&quot; the press release read.</p> <p>Spain saw the largest sentiment rise with 2.3 points in March, while Germany (negative 1.8 points) and the Netherlands (negative 1.3 points) were the worst performers.</p> <p>&quot;The ESI is a composite indicator made up of five sectoral confidence indicators with different weights,&quot; according to the commission.</p> <p>Turkey’s economic confidence rose month-on-month in March, up 3.1 percent to reach at 81.9, the Turkish Statistical Institute said early Thursday.</p> <p>EU Commission also noted that the Business Climate Indicator (BCI) for the EA dropped by 0.16 points to 0.69.</p> <p>&quot;All the five components of the indicator worsened: While managers' views of the past production, their production expectations, and their assessments of both overall and export order books declined significantly,&quot; the EC said.

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