Contraction

China's factory activity decline deepened in December, official data showed yesterday, as Beijing rounded off a year marked by its stuttering economic recovery from the pandemic.

Greek manufacturing activity contracted in April for the eighth month in a row as a marked decline in new business led to production cuts and job cuts, a survey showed on Tuesday.

Markit's Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) for manufacturing, which accounts for about 10 percent of the economy, rose to 48.2 from 46.7 in March. Readings below 50 denote contractions in activity.

A seasonal rise in industrial activity helped Romania's economy to grow by an annual 2.4 per cent in the first six months of the year, according to data released on Wednesday by the Statistics Institute, INS.

By Sotiris Nikas

The government is expecting first-quarter data to show Greece’s economic contraction at just 1 percent, against 6 percent in the same period last year.