by Colman
Tue Dec 19th, 2006 at 06:59:42 AM EST
The FT reports that Germany's flash-in-the-pan, cyclical economic good news continues with business confidence at is highest for 15 years:
The Munich-based Ifo institute’s business climate index leapt from 106.8 in November to 108.7 this month. That was the strongest reading since the pan-German survey started in 1991, shortly after reunification and suggested that the German economy would remain on a strong footing well into 2007.
...
That suggested German businesses has become noticeably less alarmed by the effects of a three percentage point rise in German VAT that takes effect in January. Unlike in France, the stronger currency has also raised few concerns.
“It is clear that the economy is booming and the good news is that expectations have rebounded forcefully over the past two months. So there are no real fears that the fiscal tightening or higher euro will be a problem,” said Dirk Schumacher, economist at Goldman Sachs in Frankfurt.
Good news for the Eurozone. Not so good news for Irish mortgage payers who over-extended themselves, but it's not as if the rising interest rates are a suprise: the ECB made this clear several years ago.
