Data from the European statistics agency Eurostat released on Thursday revealed that the eurozone slipped into a recession during the first three months of 2023. This comes after a downward revision of growth in both the first quarter of 2023 and the last quarter of 2022.
Eurozone gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 0.1% compared to the previous quarter, while it rose by 1.0% compared to the same time the previous year. The revision is primarily a result of a second estimate released by Germany’s statistics office showing that the country went into recession in early 2023. The revision also cut the euro zone’s fourth-quarter GDP growth to -0.1%.
In addition to Germany, it was also found that the GDP declined on a quarter-on-quarter basis in Greece, Ireland, Lithuania, Malta, and the Netherlands.
According to Eurostat, quarterly GDP was most heavily impacted by increased household spending, which shredded 0.1 percentage points, public expenditure, which caused a 0.3 percentage point hit, and inventory changes, dragging down GDP by 0.4 percentage points.