Eurozone GDP down 11.8% in Q2

The eurozone’s gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 11.8% while the employment rate decreased by 2.9% in the second quarter of 2020 compared to the previous quarter, Eurostat said on Tuesday. 

The European Union’s statistical office estimated that in the whole of the EU, GDP decreased by 11.4% and the employment rate dropped by 2.7% in the second quarter, when strict Covid-19 containment measures were still in place in many member-states.

These were by far the sharpest declines observed since records started in 1995, Eurostat said.

In the first quarter of 2020, GDP had decreased by 3.7% in the eurozone and by 3.3% in the EU.

Compared with the same period of 2019, seasonally adjusted GDP decreased by 14.7% in the eurozone and by 13.9% in the EU in the second quarter of 2020.

Among the EU member-states for which data are available, Spain (-18.5%) recorded the sharpest quarter-on-quarter GDP decline, followed by Croatia (-14.9%), Hungary (-14.5%), Greece (-14%), Portugal (-13.9%) and France (-13.8%).

[Xinhua]