Central Bank predicts economy will shrink this year

The Central Bank has become the latest economic forecaster to predict that the economy will shrink this year. Its latest Quarterly Bulletin also shows that lower income families have seen their real incomes decline over the past two years due to inflation while higher income groups have seen a faster recovery. Multinational companies exporting pharmaceutical…

Euro zone likely in recession, PMI surveys show

The downturn in euro zone business activity surprisingly deepened in December, according to closely watched surveys which indicated the bloc’s economy is almost certainly in recession. It was a broad-based decline with activity deteriorating in both Germany and France and across services and manufacturing, the surveys showed. Last quarter, the euro zone economy contracted 0.1%,…