Ireland: Consumer confidence deteriorates in March to lowest level since January 2021
Consumer confidence came in at 67.0 in March, down from February’s 77.0. March’s result marked the weakest sentiment since January 2021. The month-on-month drop was the sharpest since April 2020 (a 34.7-point drop), the date of the first lockdown taken in response to the arrival of the Covid-19 virus.
The softer reading was due to an across-the-board decline in the index’s subsectors, amid the impact of the war in Ukraine on energy prices and on the cost of living. Consumers downgraded their view of their personal finances over the past year by the greatest amount, with other especially large downgrades noted in consumers’ view of the current and future state of the economy. This said, consumers’ employment outlook was relatively robust, suggesting that spending will be supported somewhat by a still-strong labor market despite the effect of the war in Ukraine on inflation.