Eurozone economy did not record any quarterly growth at the end of 2022

The European Union’s statistics office (Eurostat) said that the eurozone did not record any economic growth on a quarterly basis in the last three months of 2022, in a slight downward revision of GDP and employment data, yet employment data remained strong.

Eurostat said in a statement that the growth of the euro zone economy fell to zero in the fourth quarter compared to the third quarter and 1.8 percent on an annual basis. That compared to forecasts for growth of 0.1 and 1.9 percent, respectively, published on February 14.

Nevertheless, the revisions confirmed that the eurozone economy had narrowly avoided a previously expected technical recession.

Greece, Malta and Cyprus recorded quarterly growth of more than 1 percent, with the economies of Germany, Estonia, Italy and Lithuania declining.

Eurostat said public spending contributed 0.2 percentage points, changes in inventories contributed 0.1 percentage points and net trade contributed 1.0 percentage points.

Eurostat also revised employment growth data in the eurozone downward to 0.3 percent on a quarterly basis, from 0.4 percent previously forecast. Year-on-year growth beat expectations of 1.5 percent.

The strong employment growth highlights more jobs available than there are job seekers, and points to trouble for the European Central Bank in its battle to bring inflation back to 2% from more than 10% last fall.