The economic situation in Europe continues to deteriorate as the latest data points: Eurozone retail sales and German construction PMIs disappoint. Retail sales in the Eurozone during the month of June was flat despite forecasts of a modest 0.2% improvement while German construction PMI moved sizeably lower during the same period. One standout was the German industrial orders which improved 6.4% month on month in May despite a forecasted figure of 1% expected. Looking closer into the data a lot of the increase was due to large-scale orders of ships, spacecraft and military vehicles with the rest of the sector languishing behind.
