Eurozone consumer sentiment improves in May, beats views

Consumer sentiment in the Eurozone rose to its highest level since January in May, according to a flash estimate released by the European Commission.

Consumer confidence improved 2.3 points to -7.0 from April, comfortably beating economists’ expectations for a reading of -9.0.

In the EU as a whole, economic sentiment increased 1.1 points to -5.7.

Claus Vistesen, chief Eurozone economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics said: “An upbeat surprise, and stronger than we expected. We think normalisation in energy prices will weigh on household confidence this year, but sentiment is showing resilience despite weakness in recent months.

“We don’t get any details in the advance release, but the surprise point to upside risks for next week’s headline EZ economic confidence index published by the European Commission.”