‍Euro Area

We’ve recently added a new survey from the ECB covering consumer expectations. Various segments are examined, including: 

• Housing & Credit Access
• Income & Consumption
• Inflation
• Labor & Economic Growth

Each category is then broken down by age group, country, and income quintile. In the chart below, we focus on the inflation survey across the main euro area countries, displaying perceptions of price increases over the past 12 months and expectations for inflation over the next 12 months. 

Italy is an outlier: inflation perceptions were the highest of any country, even as statistically reported inflation was among the lowest. Italians also expect inflation to surge over the next 12 months. Spanish consumers also stand out for perceiving inflation that strongly exceeds the statistical inflation rate. 

Australia

Alternative datasets are increasingly of interest to macroeconomic forecasters. Advertised job vacancies, for instance, are viewed as an informative labour market indicator. For Australia, we’ve added the Internet Vacancy Index (IVI), which tracks online job advertisements on a monthly basis and can be broken down by state and job type.

In the chart below, we compare IVI to the unemployment rate. For comparison purposes, the Y-axis of the unemployment rate is inverted: a strong negative correlation exists between both series. It also appears that the IVI index tends to move three months ahead of the unemployment rate – making it a valuable forecasting variable and leading indicator.

Panama

National accounts for Panama have been extended with the addition of the expenditure approach category, in constant and current prices. 

This now allows users to calculate contributions to GDP, as the chart below highlights. 

Dominican Republic

For the Dominican Republic, we’ve added macroeconomic expectations from the central bank. Forecasts for indicators such as exchange rate, GDP, policy rate and inflation are now available, and updated every month. 

In the chart below, we track the current inflation rate and the central bank’s future expectations.