Services in the Euro region fall in February

According to the Markit Eurozone Purchasing Managers Services Index, new business in the euro zone services sector has fallen dramatically in February. It accounts for a large section of the economy so this is likely to spell bad news for job losses which are set to reach record levels.

Ben May at Capital Economics in London has said that it is too soon to see what affect the economic downturn has had on the euro zone as Chinese manufacturing has shown signs of recovery as the stock market bounced.

The euro zone Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for the service sector has fallen to 39.2 in February, down from January’s 42.2, which is a new record low and is ten points away from the growth mark of 50.

The service sectors fell across Germany, France, Italy and Spain, the big four euro area economies.

Within the period, Britain’s services sector also contracted steeply although the rate of decline and the amount of job cuts have fallen back slightly, meanwhile in the US data for non-manufacturing PMI will be released later today, although there is a strong expectation that there will be further contractions for last month.

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