Italian Business Confidence Rises to 29-Month High, Led by Higher Exports
Italian business confidence rose in October to the highest in almost two and half years as executives grew more optimistic that an export-led economic recovery is gaining momentum.
The Isae institute’s manufacturing-sentiment index climbed to 99.8, the highest since May 2008, from a revised 98.6 in September, the Rome-based research center said in a statement today. Economists had predicted a reading of 98.5, according to the median of 18 forecasts in a Bloomberg survey.
“There is a marked recovery in orders, foreign ones in particular,” Isae said. “There is also a slight increase in companies’ expectation on production.”
As gains in exports more than offset weak domestic demand, Italian industrial output rose 1.6 percent in August, the most in seven months. Consumer confidence unexpectedly increased this month as households became more upbeat about the outlook for growth and jobs after the unemployment rate declined to a one- year low in August, Isae said yesterday.
The $2.2 trillion economy, Europe’s fourth-biggest, grew 0.5 percent in the second quarter as sales abroad were sustained by the euro’s 9 percent drop against the dollar in the period and by exports to Germany, Italy’s biggest trading partner.
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government last month revised up its growth forecast for this year to 1.2 percent from 1 percent predicted in May. It also freed up the remaining 110 million euros ($152.6 million) in consumer incentives for the purchases of electric vehicles and home appliances, the Industry Ministry said in an Oct. 21 statement.
Isae polled 4,000 companies between Oct. 1 and Oct. 19. Isae originally reported business confidence at 98.4 in September.
To contact the reporter on this story: Lorenzo Totaro in Rome at ltotaro@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: John Fraher at jfraher@bloomberg.net
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