The German ZEW indicator rose by 1.4 points to minus 53.8 in December, breaking a nine-month downtrend.
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Some modestly upbeat EU data on consumer and business confidence was released Wednesday as the Economic Sentiment Indicator rose to 91.1 in February versus 89.5 in January, and reaching the highest level since last May.
The economic-sentiment indicator for February rose sharply to 5.4 points from -21.6 in January, the first positive reading since May 2011 and much better than consensus expectations.
The Stoxx Europe 600 fell 0.2% after Moody's sovereign downgrades late Monday contrasted with positive economic data from Germany, where the ZEW economic sentiment indicator for February rose to its first positive reading since May 2011.
Starts, which are a forward indicator as they track construction, rose by an annualized rate of 750, 000 in August from a downwardly revised 733, 000 in June.
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Significantly, non-food manufactured products inflation, an indicator of demand side pressure, rose sharply from 4.8% in January to 6% in February and continues to stay well above its medium-term trend.
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Bloomberg News reported this week that another little-noticed indicator, rail shipments of waste freight, rose 45% in April and May, the highest increase since 1994.
The ratio of total wealth of the billionaires to gross domestic product (GDP) - an indicator of how extreme wealth compares with India's growth - rose from around 1% in the mid-1990s to 22% at the peak of the stock market boom in 2008, before dropping to 10% of GDP this year.
Warren Buffet was interviewed by Charlie Rose on Bloomberg a week or so ago and the conversation reminded me of an indicator that I follow.
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