The latest composite leading indicators point to weakening growth in most major economies, although unemployment remains largely unchanged, says the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
The Paris-based OECD says that its latest indicators, which are designed to anticipate turning points in economic activity relative to trend, show that most major economies will continue to see weakening growth in the coming quarters. It reports that the indicator for Canada points to weak growth, while the indicators for the United States and Japan continue to show signs of moderating growth.
In Germany, France, Italy and the Euro Area as a whole, the indicators point to continued weakening growth, the OECD adds, although the UK indicator suggests a pickup in growth.
China’s indicator also points to soft growth, but the OECD says that tentative signs are emerging that the recent deterioration in the short-term outlook may have stabilised. In India and Russia, the indicators continue to point to weak growth, while Brazil’s sees a pick-up in growth.
Separately, the OECD reports that the unemployment rate for the OECD area was at 7.9% in August, which is broadly unchanged since January 2011. Rates rose in Canada, and ticked down in the U.S., although this data is for September, it says.
In the euro area, the unemployment rate remained stable for the second consecutive month at 11.4%, following 13 months of continuous rises. However, the August level remains 4.1 percentage points above its record low of 7.3% in March 2008, it notes.
The OECD stresses that differences in unemployment rates across OECD countries remain large. The rate was highest in Spain (25.1%), followed by Greece (at 24.4% in June, which is the latest month available), Portugal (15.9%) and Ireland (15.0%). By contrast, unemployment rates remained below 5.5% in Australia, Austria, Germany, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico and the Netherlands.
There were 47.8 million people unemployed in the OECD area in August 2012, 0.1 million less than in July, but still 13.1 million more than in July 2008, it says.