Is The Recession Over In Europe?

Today, some new economic data coming from Germany & France are showing signs that both economies have finally stopped contracting.

Both France & Germany announced today a surprising GDP ( gross domestic product) growth of 0.3 percent for the 2ND quarter of 2009. Economists, in Germany & France, had predicted more contraction of their respective economies  after 4 consecutive quarters of negative growth.

By comparison, in the 1ST quarter of 2009, France’s economy GDP had fallen by 1.3 percent. In the same time frame, Germany’s GDP had decreased by 3.5 percent.

However, the good news for France & Germany are not reflecting the rest of the EU. The GDP for the complete Euro-zone dropped by 0.1 percent overall during the 2ND quarter. Germany & France are the biggest economies in continental Europe, and could help pull the rest of the EU out of the recession.

France’s finance & economy Minister, Christine Lagarde, expressed her satisfaction in an interview with the radio station RTL. She stated:”France is finally coming out of the red. These are obviously very positive numbers, which have surprised us and made us quite happy.”

For Germany, today’s news marked the end of the deepest recession since WW II.