Services PMI 47.9 vs 52.0 expectedPrior 53.3<\/p>\n
Ouch. That’s a rough hit as Spain’s services sector sees a marked drop in both new business and confidence. The negative impact ties to the Middle East conflict, as costs continue to rise sharply on the month and weighing on demand conditions. HCOB notes that “sales volumes were down
\ndue to a stagnant business environment amid widespread
\nuncertainty related to the war in the Middle East”.<\/p>\n
Adding that new export business was heavily hit, with conditions slumping by the most since July 2022. Meanwhile, sentiment on future activity among Spanish firms also took a heavy knock in falling to the lowest since December 2022.<\/p>\n
As for inflation pressures, surging energy prices continue to have an impact with operating expenses increasing at a rate well above the survey
\naverage. That was despite the rate of inflation easing a little
\nfrom the near three-year high in March.<\/p>\n
HCOB notes that:<\/p>\n
\u201cUnlike the somewhat surprisingly decent manufacturing
\nsector performance \u2013 although admittedly here growth
\nwas driven by client stockpiling as part of efforts to
\nsecure goods on fears of product shortages and supply
\ndisruption \u2013 the downbeat April PMI figures for services
\nwere somewhat less unexpected in the context of the
\nknock to confidence that the war in the Middle East has
\ncaused.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFims widely reported that market demand had
\nsoftened as widespread uncertainty led businesses and
\nconsumers alike to hesitate when it came to spending
\ndecisions. This was driven in the main by the uncertainty
\nthat the war in the Middle East has caused but also
\ngrowing worries over the spectre of inflation as the
\nimpact of the energy price and supply shock ripples
\nthrough the global economy.<\/p>\n
\u201cReflecting the impact that the war has had on
\nsentiment, service providers reported their lowest
\nlevel of confidence since late 2022 and this bleaker
\nassessment of the outlook may well be helping to keep
\nfirms\u2019 pricing power just about in check. Although selling
\nprices were again raised markedly, the rate of inflation
\neased a little since March and crucially remains well
\nbelow levels seen back in 2022 and early 2024 suggesting
\nthat full-blown second round inflation effects have yet to
\nfully materialise.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Services PMI 47.9 vs 52.0 expectedPrior 53.3 Ouch. That’s a rough hit as Spain’s services sector sees a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428385,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,184,85,46],"class_list":["post-428384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}