the euro zone trade surplus. a better net trade result in the first quarter came mainly from higher exports of machinery, vehicles and chemicals and a drop in imports of energy. imports from russia, once a key supplier of oil and gas to the eu, were 72.1% lower in the january march period than a year earlier as the eu stopped buying most of its energy from moscow following the russian invasion of ukraine in late february 2022. joining me is sylvain broyer, chief economist emea, s&p global ratings. what to be make of these numbers? a pretty anaemic growth figure. there are a few positives, pretty anaemic growth figure. there are a few positives, the pretty anaemic growth figure. ii” are a few positives, the european economy has avoided recession, there is an upsurge in demand partly related to the opening of china and the european industry and job creation are strong. the outlook for the second quarter and third quarter is still 0k, the second quarter and third quarter i
uk unemployment rose to 3.9% in the first quarter, the highest level since the three months to january 2022 and worse than expected. the number of employees on the payroll fell by 136,000 in april, the first drop since february 2021. the number of people not working due to long term sickness hit a new record high. job vacancies fell by 55,000 in the three months to april with 1.083 million job vacancies on average from february to april. the ex boss of audi rupert stadler has made a confession about his role in the vw diesel scandal. this makes him the first former vw board member to plead guilty to knowing about the illegal software being used to cheat on vw diesel emissions tests. stadler has made the confession in exchange for a suspended sentence and a payment of 1.1 million euros. british men are taking payments of thousands of pounds to pose