Data released on Thursday shows that the eurozone has contracted for two straight quarters. This means that it has technically entered a recession. Which indicates that the single currency area, which has experienced energy shocks, war, inflation, and monetary tightening, has lost its growth momentum.
JUST IN: 🇪🇺 Eurozone officially enters recession.
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) June 8, 2023
The eurozone is an unofficial title for the 20 European Union (EU) countries. These countries are part of the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and use the euro as their shared currency.
Eurostat, the EU’s statistics office, says that the GDP of the Eurozone fell by 0.1 percent in the first three months of 2023 compared to the previous quarter. GDP was also changed to be lower for the last quarter of 2022, from 0 percent to -0.1 percent.
Previous flash estimates for the first quarter of the year, which were announced in April, said that the eurozone grew by 0.1%. The data released on Thursday shows that this estimate was too high. These were changed down because Germany entered a recession. Its figures showed that the economy contracted for the second straight quarter, hence the country was put into a recession.
In the first quarter of this year, employment in the eurozone grew by 0.6%. Marking more than the 0.3% growth in the previous quarter.
