Price Trends over the Next 12 Months

Study title: Business and consumer surveys (ei_bcs)

The Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN) of the European Commission conducts five monthly, harmonised surveys for the economies in the European Union (EU) and in the candidate countries. They are addressed to representatives of the industry (manufacturing), services, retail trade and construction sectors, as well as to consumers. A few additional questions are asked on a quarterly and biannual basis. These surveys allow comparisons among different countries’ business cycles and have become an indispensable tool for monitoring the evolution of the EU and the euro area economies, as well as monitoring developments in the candidate countries.

Monthly Confidence Indicators (CIs) reflecting overall perceptions and expectations are calculated separately for all four business sectors covered by the survey programme, as well as consumers. The computation is done both at country and aggregate level (EU and euro area).

A monthly Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) is calculated based on a selection of questions from the industry, services, retail trade, construction and consumer surveys at country level and at aggregate level (EU and euro area) in order to track overall economic activity. The ESI has been calculated since 1985.

Since 2020, the set of monthly composite indicators also contains an Employment Expectations Indicator (EEI), which helps getting a timely indication of expected changes in dependent employment. The indicator is constructed as a weighted average of the employment expectations of managers in four surveyed business sectors (industry, services, retail trade and construction).

Detailed methodological information about the BCS surveys and indicators is provided in a user guide to the Joint Harmonised EU Programme of Business and Consumer Surveys.

1. We collect data directly from official government sources, most often via an API provided by the relevant statistical office. For this purpose, we use proprietary algorithms that retrieve and aggregate all information into our database.
2. We standardize and clean the data for better analysis and readability. We remove unnecessary elements and adjust the structure to a unified format, which ensures consistency between different data sets. This enables visual interpretation of statistics as well as comparative analysis — both by humans and analytical systems (including artificial intelligence).
3. We verify the information and design an interactive chart. We aim to make the information transparent and easy to understand, so we start with a presentation of general indicators that serve as a starting point for deeper data exploration. The user can then dive into the details using interactive chart features. We do not interfere with the content or meaning of the data — our role is solely to organize and facilitate access to the information.
4. We create metadata and translate the chart into other languages. Each chart is supplemented with sources, survey details, and other information provided by the data supplier. We also use our own AI models to generate a short summary of the chart. Finally, we translate the content and publish the charts on 47 international Content Writer websites to share valuable information with the world.
5. We regularly update and expand the data. Our scripts "listen" to data providers’ websites and retrieve the latest information as soon as updates appear. We then recreate the chart summary to reflect recent changes. The update is published, and interested users are informed about the current trend.

The data is processed by Content Writer — a limited liability company based in Poland — as part of the independent WorldIndex project. The initiative’s goal is to provide free access to current public data for analyzing trends and better understanding the world.

We also offer commercial access to the WorldIndex API, which provides direct access to data via an API. This allows companies, organizations, and individual users to integrate a real-time information stream into their applications, analytical systems, or AI models.

Data provider: European Commission - Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs (ECFIN).

The source of the information is available at: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/api/dissemination/statistics/1.0/data/ei_bsco_m.

If you have detailed questions about the study, we encourage you to contact the data provider directly.