Eurozone unemployment falls, growth accelerates

PanARMENIAN.Net - Growth in the eurozone accelerated, inflation rose towards the ECB's key target and unemployment fell to a seven-year low as the bloc's economy shrugged off uncertainty over Brexit and US President Donald Trump, AFP reports.

The EU's Eurostat statistics agency said growth in the eurozone sped up in the fourth quarter of 2016 to 0.5 percent, beating analysts' estimates.

The data meant that the eurozone economy grew by 1.7 percent in 2016, exceeding the United States which gained 1.6 percent last year.

Faster growth came on a spike in consumer demand in France and Spain while Germany's export-driven economy remained on a solid course.

Inflation in the eurozone meanwhile jumped to 1.8 percent in January, a big leap from 1.1 percent a month earlier.

That will put pressure on the European Central Bank to scale back its controversial stimulus measures as it nears its stated target figure of inflation below but close to 2.0 percent.

EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici cautioned that the solid growth data still fell short of a full recovery.

"The recovery is solid for the fifth year running... but it is still too weak to create all the jobs we need," Moscovici said.

Moscovici, a former French finance minister, also insisted that the inflation data were shy of the objectives set out by the ECB when it embarked on its stimulus programme.