Statistics Sweden is currently publishing the activity indicator to provide early data on the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on the Swedish economy. This publication does not form part of the ordinary statistics production and is based on Statistics Sweden’s economic monthly statistics.

The increase in November makes it the sixth consecutive month with positive developments. However, growth figures for November are lower than for previous months.

“The continued recovery was hampered by a downturn in consumer spending,” says Mattias Kain Wyatt, statistician at Statistics Sweden.
For more information on consumption, see the Household consumption indicator.

Economic activity has increased since June (seasonally adjusted volume growth and index level)

Activity in the economy was 2.0 percent lower in November 2020 than in November 2019. There were no working day effects. On the production side, loss of output compared with the corresponding month in 2019 is mainly explained by lower production of services.

Further information on the development in the business sector is available in the Production value index.

Working day-adjusted growth in October has been revised to -1.9 percent, up from the previous -2.2 percent.

Statistics Sweden will publish the monthly activity indicator on the following dates:

Facts: The activity indicator

The activity indicator is designed to highlight the collected activities in the Swedish economy in a way similar to the description of growth in GDP. It describes how the Swedish economy has developed on a monthly basis, unlike the quarterly National Accounts. The indicator is based on a considerably smaller material than the GDP calculations and therefore is less reliable.

In order to report a single figure for GDP, a balance of the calculations from the production and use sides is made. This means that one side is adjusted downwards and the other side is adjusted upwards. Before reconciliation, the statistical material showed that economic activities, measured from the use side, decreased by 2.8 percent, while the production side noted a decrease of 1.1 percent compared with the corresponding month a year ago. This led to a reconciled activity indicator of minus 2.0 percent.

Links

Time series for the activity indicator (Excel file)

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