[denphone]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

Perhaps you should read this…

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-forecast.html

And this….

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business...-bind-britain/

[EXTRACT]

…the German economy actually shrank in the final quarter of last year, unlike the UK, which merely stagnated.

Nor is the mood music in Germany around the current quarter at all good either. The manufacturing PMIs are down, and although the latest Ifo index reading suggests that things may now be picking up a bit, the second consecutive drop in Ifo's so-called "current assessment" points to another quarter of economic contraction yet to come.

This would push Germany into the technical definition of a recession (two consecutive quarters of declining growth). But for the unseasonably warm weather and a large dollop of fiscal stimulus, which protected German consumers and industry from the full impact of surging energy prices, it could have been a great deal worse. A mild recession would have become a deep one.

As it is, German GDP has already slipped back down below its pre-pandemic level, and looks set to fall further. The same fate awaits Italy, according to forecasts by Moody’s Investors Service. Japan too looks to be in the danger zone.

Things hardly look brilliant in Britain either, with the full force of rising energy bills and mortgage rates still to be felt. Even so, we seem to be on an improving trend, and no longer in such a bad way relative to others as we were.

This is the very reverse of what the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was forecasting only as recently as last month. In an update to its World Economic Outlook, the IMF said it expected the UK to contract this year, but for the rest of the G7 to show some growth.

Nice try but given these 2 newspapers are propagandist newspapers for the government l would not trust a word that is written in these compliant daily rags.