Italy service sector growth slows for second month in June -PMI

ROME (Reuters) – Italy’s services sector growth slowed for a second month running in June amid high inflation and faltering demand, a survey showed on Tuesday.

S&P Global’s Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for services declined to 51.6 in June from 53.7 in May, slipping closer to the 50 mark that separates growth from contraction and posting the lowest reading since January.

The result was broadly in line with the median forecast of 51.5 in a Reuters survey of 13 analysts.

The sub-index for new business in the service sector stood at 52.3 in June compared to 54.8 in May.

Italy’s manufacturing PMI, released on Friday, showed the sector grew at its slowest pace for two years in June, as uncertainty linked to the war in Ukraine weighs on the euro zone’s third-largest economy.

The composite Purchasing Managers’ Index for services and manufacturing stood at 51.3 in June, down from 52.4 in May and the lowest reading since January.

Italian gross domestic product edged up just 0.1% in the first quarter from the previous three months, and Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s government in April revised down its 2022 growth forecast to 3.1% from a 4.7% projection made last September.

(Reporting by Gavin Jones; Editing by Catherine Evans)