Governments have taken their first steps towards lifting the restrictions which caused the economy to collapse in the past few weeks. As a result, high frequency indicators show some people returning to the streets in major cities and a small rebound in electricity consumption. However, the economic downturn in April seems to have been at least as deep as we had feared. And governments will tread carefully in easing the restrictions to stop the reproduction rate from rising again. This suggests that the economic rebound, though beginning a little earlier than we had anticipated, may also be slower than we had expected. There is a lot more uncertainty than normal, but we doubt that the euro-zone economy will get back to its pre-crisis levels until beyond 2022.
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