Central bank reports “marked deterioration” in economic activity

  • Lusa
  • 28 January 2021

The Bank of Portugal signalled a marked deterioration in economic activity during the past week.

Portugal’s central bank, Bank of Portugal (BoP), on Thursday launched a new weekly economic indicator, which signals the marked deterioration in economic activity during the past week.

“After the start of the lockdown decreed on January 15, the daily economic activity indicator (DEI) pointed to a marked deterioration during the past week,” the BoP reports said.

This new indicator will make it easier to identify abrupt changes in economic activity and will be released weekly on Thursday with information up to the previous Sunday.

The disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic in the global economy have made the use high-frequency data to capture very short-term economic developments, more important the BoP said.

The indicator summarises quantitative information every day, such as heavy commercial vehicle traffic on motorways, electricity and natural gas consumption, cargo and mail landed at national airports and credit/debit card purchases in Portugal by residents and non-residents.