LJUBLJANA (Slovenia), April 2 (SeeNews) – Slovenia's economic sentiment index plunged by 8.8 percentage points (pps) month-on-month to negative 3.7 pps in March, when the coronavirus crisis hit the economy, the country's statistical office said.
On an annual comparison basis, the overall economic sentiment indicator was 12.5 pps lower in March, after dropping by 3.9 pps in February, the statistical office said in a statement earlier this week.
The monthly decrease in March followed a rise of 1.1 pps in February and came as a result of deterioration of confidence indicators in almost all sectors, including services (down 3.5 pps), manufacturing (down 3.4 pps), retail trade (down 1.3 pps), as well as consumer confidence (down 0.6 pps). Only the confidence indicator in construction had no impact on the economic sentiment index.
On an annual comparison basis, the March decline was evident in all confidence indicators, with services dropping 4.5 pps, manufacturing shrinking 4.3 pps, consumer confidence down 2.3 pps, retail trade declining by 0.9 pps and construction shedding 0.5 pps.
The sentiment indicator is the weighted average of the confidence indicators in manufacturing, retail trade, construction, services and the consumer confidence indicator.