Services sector growth quickens for first time since April

Growth in the services sector accelerated last month for the first time since April as new business increased and exports rebounded.

The AIB Global S&P Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) rose to 54.2 from 52.6 in October. The index has stayed above the 50 mark separating growth from contraction since early 2021 and comfortably so for most of this year.

The faster expansion was driven by growth in new business for the first time in six months and a bounceback in new export orders, which had contracted in October for the first time in 32 months.

Cost pressures also eased a touch, with the prices charged by service providers, while still relatively high, slowing to a two-and-a-half year low.

Activity has softened more broadly in Ireland in recent months following a sharp bounceback from the Covid pandemic, with unemployment ticking up to 4.8 per cent from a near record low of 4.1 per cent in February and data on Friday showing that the domestic economy did not grow between the second and third quarters.

The service sector firms surveyed were also at their most confident in six months in November, with "a general mood of optimism that economic conditions will improve in 2024", the survey's authors said. -Reuters