European Business Cycle Indicators – 4th Quarter 2016

This technical paper is divided into three parts. It first presents the developments in survey indicators in the 4th Quarter of 2016. In the second part, the results of the autumn 2016 EU Investment Survey in the manufacturing sector are presented: euro-area and EU real manufacturing investment rose in 2016 and were foreseen to increase further in 2017, with variations at country level. The third part deals with the Special Topic 'Measuring uncertainty using survey data – what do we measure?'. This special topic investigates whether disagreement measures based on qualitative assessments of future economic developments of participants in business and consumer surveys can adequately measure the dispersion of expectations.