Update on UK economic growth figures brings little change
While the delay in publishing economic growth figures for the first quarter of 2010 began to set alarm bells ringing, in the end the figure remains unchanged at 0.3%. However, if you dig deep into today's press release from the Office for National Statistics you'll find that from the peak to the trough of the UK downturn the UK economy fell by 6.4% as opposed to an initial forecast of 6.2%. While this revision does seem fairly minimal, it does show how far the UK economy fell during those dark times.
While there were some sighs of relief that the first-quarter figures for 2010 were no worse than initially expected, there is concern about a lack of improvement in export markets at a time when sterling is still languishing on the currency exchanges. Indeed, the figures presented by the Office for National Statistics seem to show that without the input of the UK government, and the public sector, the UK economy may well have dipped back into recession in the early part of 2010.
Analysts and investors are finding this delay in publishing revised figures very difficult because it makes a very complicated situation even more complicated. If analysts are unable to depend upon the figures released by the Office for National Statistics, who can they trust?
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