Black Friday Sale- prices in Europe close to freezing, by Andrew Wishart

...And Markets for all

Today marks ‘Black Friday’ with low prices exciting consumers across the globe as America’s retail tradition spreads. However, low prices are causing a real headache for policymakers and economists across Europe. This morning’s inflation figures for November confirm Europe is on the brink of deflation, a scenario in which the price level falls. This may sound like a good thing, but it is usually regarded as very damaging, and I will come back to why later.

First a look at the figures. Overall euro area inflation (the change in prices compared to the same month a year ago) fell to 0.3 per cent in November, down from 0.4 per cent last month, matching the five year low seen in September and in line with market expectations. The below charts are really useful in seeing what is driving these price changes and also allow us to unpick which items drove the…

View original post 635 more words

Author: Damian Merciar

Damian Merciar is Managing Director of Merciar Business Consulting, http://www.merciar.com, a niche business economics consultancy founded in 1998. He has over twenty years experience in the areas of commercial Business Strategy. He is experienced in the transition environments of nationalized to private sector state utilities and the senior practice of commercial management, advisorial consultancy, and implementation. He has carried out policy advisory work for government ministries and been an adviser to institutional bodies proposing changes to government. He holds an MSc Economics from the University of Surrey’s leading Economics department and an MBA from the University of Kent. Also attending the leading University in the Middle East, studying International Relations and Language, for which he won a competitive international scholarship, and has a BA (Hons) in Economic History and Political Economy from the University of Portsmouth. He is currently based in London. View all posts by Damian Merciar