European Industrial Production Down 1.9% in May

Industrial production in the Eurozone fell by 1.9% on the month in May compared to April, and fell by 0.9% across the EU(27).

The full breakdown of the contraction is as follows:

• In April 2009 compared with March 2009, production of non-durable consumer goods fell by 0.7% in the euro area and by 0.2% in the EU27.
• Durable consumer goods decreased by 0.8% and 0.3% respectively.
• Production of energy dropped by 1.1% in the euro area and by 0.2% in the EU27.
• Intermediate goods declined by 1.7% and 0.8% respectively
• Capital goods fell by 2.7% in the euro area and by 1.4% in the EU27

Though a contraction was expected, the size of the contraction still comes as a shock to most analysts. A bigger shock however was that Latvia, currently making the headlines because its economy is in freefall registered the biggest increase in industrial production at 4.8%.

The fact that Spain also registered an increase of 2.0% in industrial output will also come as a shock to many. Italy also recorded and increase of 1.1% and the biggest falls were in Slovenia (-3.8%), Finland (-3.4%) and Estonia (-2.8%).