Industrial output excluding energy accelerated in the eurozone in January as manufacturing picked up in a number of core bloc members, but declined in Portugal and bailout recipient Ireland. Production in the 17 countries using the euro rose by 0.3 percent from December, the European Union's statistics office Eurostat said on Monday, in line with the average forecast in a Reuters poll of 37 economists.
On an annual basis, the increase was 6.6 percent, marginally greater than the expected 6.4 percent. The December figures were revised up, to show a gain of 0.3 percent month-on-month from a previous 0.1 percent fall and to an annual rise of 8.8 percent from 8.0 percent, suggesting the cold snap had not hampered activity as much as initially thought. Energy production declined by 3.1 percent in January after a 2.5 percent rise in December.
Of 10 eurozone countries for which data was available, production rose in Estonia, France, Germany, Malta, Slovakia and Spain and fell in Finland, Ireland, Italy and Portugal - the latter by 4.2 percent. Carsten Brzeski, economist at ING in Brussels, said the January data showed the industrial recovery was continuing, mainly driven by stronger core eurozone countries.
"But January is before the oil crisis. The February and March numbers are the ones to look at. Then we will see how resilient the recovery is," he said. Howard Archer of IHS Global Insight said industrial production was likely to gain further in the near term at least, but could lose momentum in the course of this year.
Eurozone production of intermediate goods such as steel rose by 2.5 percent in January, its steepest increase in four years, after a 1.2 percent decline in December. Output of durable consumer goods also picked up 2.5 percent, an eight-month high, after a 0.6 percent drop in December. The Eurostat data does not entirely match industrial production data issued by the member countries, because it does not include construction.
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