{"id":132239,"date":"2026-09-07T12:13:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T12:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/132239\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T12:13:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T12:13:16","slug":"spike-in-irish-gdp-triggers-growth-upgrade-for-euro-zone-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/132239\/","title":{"rendered":"Spike in Irish GDP triggers growth upgrade for euro zone \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The euro zone economy expanded by more than originally estimated in the second quarter on the back of a sharp upward in Irish GDP (gross domestic product), according to Eurostat.<\/p>\n

Euro zone GDP increased 0.6 per cent, up from a preliminary estimate of 0.4 per cent, the agency said on Monday.<\/p>\n

This was the strongest quarterly pace in more than a year and comes after growth across the bloc stagnated in the first quarter of 2026.<\/p>\n

The better-than-anticipated reading comes on the back a 10.2 per cent jump in GDP in Ireland in second quarter, up from a previous estimate of 3.9 per cent.<\/p>\n

The expansion was driven by a 22 per cent spike in output from the multinational-dominated \u201cindustry\u201d sector here which includes big pharma groups such as Eli Lilly<\/a> and Pfizer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Eli Lilly shipped $42.3 billion (\u20ac36.4 billion) of ingredients for its weight-loss drugs Mounjaro<\/a> and Zepboud from Ireland to the US in the first four months of 2025.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0ECB must be ready to raise interest rates further, argues Gabriel MakhloufOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

This was initially put down to the company strategically front-loading product into the US to avoid tariffs <\/a>but it also relates to the explosive demand for these drugs globally, which has continued in 2026.<\/p>\n

Irish GDP is susceptible to large quarterly revisions because of the large multinationals using Ireland as a base for exports and economists view it as an unreliable metric. <\/p>\n

Modified domestic demand (MDD), seen as a better measure of underlying activity here, shrank by 0.8 per cent in the second quarter.<\/p>\n

\"\"Has the Government\u2019s strategy to keep fuel costs down proved to be \u2018knee-jerk\u2019 and difficult to reverse?<\/p>\n

Despite inflation <\/a>at a three-year high due to the Iran war and borrowing costs rising, the outlook is looking rosier for Europe as governments spend big on defence and infrastructure, and companies invest in artificial intelligence. Germany, the region\u2019s largest economy, appears to be leaving behind a years-long malaise.<\/p>\n

Eurostat\u2019s data are the last major input for the European Central Bank before it sets interest rates on Thursday. Investors are betting on a quarter-point increase, a move officials will be more confident about knowing growth in the 21-nation economy is robust.<\/p>\n

Analysts including Bantleon\u2019s Daniel Hartmann now expect expansion of more than 1 per cent this year, well above the 0.8 per cent predicted by the European Central Bank (ECB) in June. Economists at JPMorgan, BNP Paribas and Societe Generale are among those who have recently added a hike by the ECB at year-end to their outlooks.<\/p>\n

Enrique Diaz-Alvarez, chief economist at global financial services firm Ebury, said: \u201cGrowth momentum indicators like the PMIs (purchasing managers\u2019 index) continue to paint a picture of economic resilience in the euro area that, together with core inflation still running above target and the Iran war dragging on without a clear ending in sight, gives the ECB sufficient justification to keep raising rates.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA 25 basis point hike from the governing council this week is fully priced in by swap markets, so anything less would be not just a major shock but a big disappointment for investors.,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe more important question for currency markets is whether there is any pushback against expectations for a 3 per cent terminal rate in 2027,\u201d he said. \u2013 Additional reporting by Bloomberg<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The euro zone economy expanded by more than originally estimated in the second quarter on the back of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":132240,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2480],"tags":[21974,7708,64753,32379,2487,2486,2485,6980,6014,64754,29787,64755,4619,64756,11116,64757,9265,64758,11897],"class_list":["post-132239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-euro-zone","tag-background","tag-company","tag-company-logo","tag-eli-lilly","tag-euro-area","tag-euro-zone","tag-eurozone","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-illustration-photo","tag-medical","tag-medical-bottles","tag-medicines","tag-nurphoto","tag-pharma","tag-pharmaceutical","tag-pharmaceuticals","tag-pharmaceutics","tag-screen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}