CYPRUS: Business confidence retreats in March

The 0.2 point drop in the Economic Sentiment Indicator conducted by the Economics Research Centre of the University of Cyprus, followed a 0.9 point improvement in the February survey.
The ERC said that the drop in confidence among businesses was based on the pessimistic projections for the following month, while the sentiment drop among consumers was on a retreat in trust among households.
The survey said that although still in negative territory, the construction sector, the one-time darling of the Cyprus economy and a driver of growth, saw an improvement in March due to the “lesser pessimistic” assessment of projects under review and the prospects of employment in the next three months.
The sentiment among the services and manufacturing sectors remained unchanged from February.