Economic sentiment decreases in Romania in line with the evolution within the EU

In September, the Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) decreased in Romania, confirming the decline visible within both the EU and the euro area. After four months of successive advance, the ESI fell from 101 to 99.8 points, according to the survey displayed on the EU Commission’s website.

Of the five sectors analyzed, an improvement of the indicator has been recorded only in construction (from -21.8 to -19.6), although there’s a negative perception, whereas the industry, services, consumer and retail trade have all seen declining confidence. So, the industry confidence remains negative, dropping by 0.3 points (from -0.1 to -0.4), while the services confidence declined from 8.9 to 7.7 percent. Consumer confidence, also negative, saw a higher decrease, by 1.9 points from -27.5 to -29.4, yet the sharpest drop was recorded by retail trade, the indicator falling from 11.7 to 6.6 points.

Overall, the EU indicator decreased by 1 point to 103.6, while the euro-area indicator drop by 0.7 points to 99.9, the negative developments mainly reflecting more cautious views of consumers and the retail trade sector.

Amongst the largest euro-area economies, sentiment increased only in Spain (+0.5), while it remained broadly flat in the Netherlands (+0.3), France (+0.2) and Germany (-0.3) and shed in Italy (-0.9). A slipping sentiment has been observed in the largest EU economies outside the euro area, as well (the UK: -0.9, Poland: -0.4, Sweden: -2.6). In line with euro-area developments, confidence only strengthened in the construction sector, while remaining unchanged in services and fading in the retail trade and financial sector, as well as among consumers.