Productivity data
On Wednesday it will be the turn of flash productivity. The data will be released for the last quarter of 2017 and we are sure there will be a lot of focus on this release since sluggish productivity has been one of the key economic issue in the years after the financial crisis. The previous quarter showed a good result with productivity growing by 0.9% quarter on quarter. This was the best result since 2011, however it was not “concern-free”. The result was highly related to a quite sharp decrease in hours worked, which may have been just a temporary effect and it’s possible that Q4 may “adjust” the strong Q3 performance.
Labour data
The same day will be also the turn of labour market data. Months of inflation higher than the 2% BoE target have tightened the belt of UK consumers. In the last months earnings have started to show some signs of raising, however not as much as inflation.
We are sure that the Bank of England will keep a close eye on the figures to see if domestic inflationary pressures are actually building up.
In the last releases both manufacturing and whole economy weekly earnings increased by 2.4% when year on year 3-month average is considered. Expectations are for a growth confirmed at 2.4%.
GDP 2nd release
On Thursday the ONS will publish their results for the second GDP release. The focus will be on whether or not the 0.5% quarterly growth will be confirmed and, even more, on the demand breakdown. Business investment grew by 0.5% in the last 2 quarters. Are businesses ready to invest more in order to satisfy a busy order book and increase their production capacity?
Pay bulletin
On Thursday our Pay Bulletin results will be also out!
Last month manufacturing wages saw an average settlement of 2.3%. How will the figures turn out this month? Stay tuned to find it out!