The overall business activity on both sides of the Atlantic continued to expand in May, and the United States even stood at a 13-month high, mainly driven by the boom in the service industry, which offset the shrinking recession in the manufacturing sector.

 

The S&P global agency announced on the 23rd that the U.S. manufacturing and service industry composite purchasing managers index (PMI) unexpectedly rose to 54.5, the highest point since April last year, of which the service industry PMI rose from 53.6 to 55.1, but the manufacturing PMI fell It dropped sharply from 50.2 to 48.5, falling below the 50 dividing point between boom and bust. The euro zone also showed a similar situation. The manufacturing PMI unexpectedly dropped to 44.6, which is farther from the dividing point of prosperity and contraction; the service industry PMI dropped to 55.9, but still remained in the high expansion zone.

 

The Standard & Poor's report also pointed out that more and more evidence shows that the German manufacturing industry is quite weak, which continues to drag down the manufacturing boom in the entire euro zone. Previously, the DIHK agency also expected that the euro zone economy would grow at zero this year, because the business community could not see evidence of a sustained recovery in the economy.

 

Since the main force of the European economy is in the service industry, the composite PMI indicator still shows that the overall economy in the euro zone continues to expand, but the speed is a problem, which may make this year's growth rate fall short of the 0.4% forecast by the European Commission.

 

"The economy is likely to grow in the second quarter due to the health of the services sector. However, the manufacturing sector is a big drag on the overall economy. German manufacturers are struggling in particular," said Herbia, chief economist at Hamburg Commerzbank.

 

Not only is the economic growth in the Eurozone clouded, but underlying inflationary pressures are also entangled. Producer prices fell in April for the first time since September 2020, but prices in the service sector continued to rise due to strong demand. Data from France and Germany also show a similar trend.

(Source: udn0524)