The Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) rose by 2.7% to 105.7 points in December, according to the latest Bank of Albania’s Business and Consumer Confidence Survey.

The ESI improved due to the increased confidence across all the business sectors, while construction and services provided the biggest contribution in this regard. In parallel, consumer confidence continued improving in this month as well.

Central Bank said that increase in ESI coincides with the inflation slowdown in recent months.

According to Central Bank, the Industry Confidence Indicator (ICI) increased by about 2.9 percentage points compared to the previous month, driven by the improvement in all its component indicators, particularly the increased balance on current production and order books.

In addition, businesses operating in industry sector increased their production expectations for the future, while decreasing their employment and selling price expectations.

Construction Confidence Indicator (BCI)  posted  the  second  significant  improvement running by 5.5 percentage points in December 2022, due to better appraisals about construction and order books in the future.

Trade Confidence Indicator (TCI) maintained an upward trend by about 1.8 percentage points this month. The indicator was affected by more positive assessments on the current business performance and employment in the future. Expectations for prices in the future were revised downward.

Consumer Confidence Indicator (CCI) improved by about 1.8 percentage points in December, though remaining below the long-term average.

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The increase in industry confidence indicator was mainly driven by the positive performance of order books from exports, according to the Bank of Albania’s latest Business and Consumer Confidence Survey.

“The capacity utilization rate in industry stood at 78.9%, in third quarter of 2021, around 2.9 percentage points higher than the previous quarter. The indicator of businesses’ financial situation in industry sector continued to improve compared to the previous quarters,” central bank said.

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According to central bank findings, improvement of confidence in services has shifted the level of confidence indicator above the long-term average, for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, also driven by the significantly positive expectations from the tourism sector at start of the summer tourism season 2021.

The positive assessments of businesses related to the performance of both business situation and demand affected the confidence indicator.

In addition, businesses appear optimistic regarding growth of the demand in the future.

Other survey indicators, including the financial health, employment and employment and capacity utilization rate, also showed an upward trend.

Businesses operating in this sector seem to have used their capacities at a higher rate than a month ago and expectations suggest a steadily progressive upward trend.

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According to business and consumer survey conducted by the Bank of Albania, BoA, the economic sentiment indicator, ESI increased by 10.3 % in the first quarter of 2021, compared to the previous quarter.

The improvement of the economic sentiment indicator, ESI is mainly attributed to the increased consumer and business confidence.

The confidence indicator in the industrial sector marked a strong increase during the first quarter, with 9.5% moving above the historical average for the first time, since the negative shock of a year ago.

This is mainly attributed to the increase of the production balance by 20.3% and the balance of the ordering contracts by 11.8%.

The confidence indicator in the construction sector increased by 8% during the first quarter.

While, during the first quarter the confidence indicator in the services and the trade sectors increased by respectively 9.5% and 5.4%. //a.i/