STOCK MARKET WATCH - Tuesday, 31 January 2012

[Ghost Dog]

32. German unemployment keeps falling

German unemployment fell to a record low this month, data showed Tuesday, as the deep restructuring and wage moderation of recent years shielded Europe's biggest economy from the worst of the debt crisis.

In nominal terms, the number of people registered as unemployed rose by 301,500 to 3.082 million in January, equivalent to a jobless rate - which measures the unemployment total as a proportion of the population as a whole - of 7.3 percent, data published by the Federal Labour Agency in Nuremberg showed.

That rate was an increase from the December level of 6.6 percent, but labour agency chief Frank Weise insisted the headline increase in unemployment was solely due to seasonal factors...

... Seasonally-adjusted data, calculated separately by the Bundesbank, showed that the jobless total actually decreased by 34,000 to 2.849 million this month, the lowest level since German unification in 1991.

And the seasonally-adjusted jobless rate slipped to a record low of 6.7 percent in January from 6.8 in December.

The figures were much better than expected: analysts had been pencilling in a drop of just 10,000 in the jobless total this month.

/... http://www.iol.co.za/business/international/german-unemployment-keeps-falling-1.1224283