Corporates caught on social contract standards

<p>Kia ora,</p><p>Welcome to Thursday's Economy Watch where we follow the economic events and trends that affect New Zealand.</p><p>I'm David Chaston and this is the International edition from Interest.co.nz.</p><p>Today we lead with news corporate social action plans are under the microscope today.</p><p>But first, the warnings we have been reporting earlier this week keep coming in the US. Now the February durable goods order data shows them -1.1% lower than for the prior month, and that is a worse outcome than the +0.8% rise expected. It is also well down from the +3.5% rise in January. Year-on-year at least it is +2.3% higher. Companies are investing however; non-defence capital goods orders are a strong +13% higher year-on-year.</p><p>The more up-to-date <a href="https://www.markiteconomics.com/Public/Home/PressRelease/565cc8b204be4b789af68dbfabf9746b" target="_blank"><strong>March data</strong></a> for PMIs is fortunately more positive, indicating a continuing moderate level of expansion for both manufacturing (59.0) and services (60.0). New order growth is the best since 2015 and new export orders are part of the reason.</p><p>In <a href="https://www.markiteconomics.com/Public/Home/PressRelease/915fc8d4de984846827104fdc49060b7" target="_blank"><strong>Europe</strong></a>, this same survey suggests they returned to an economic expansion in March for the first time in six months. This was led by factories, especially in <a href="https://www.markiteconomics.com/Public/Home/PressRelease/fcea875183d5441e84192838d3d62ff9" target="_blank"><strong>Germany</strong></a>. The German service sector was one of the few majors to expand.</p><p>The long-term negative <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/files/flash_consumers_2021_03_en.pdf" target="_blank"><strong>European consumer sentiment</strong></a> eased somewhat in March.</p><p>In China, the world’s largest clothing brand, Sweden's H&M , is <a href="https://qz.com/1988374/hm-faces-a-boycott-in-china-over-year-old-xinjiang-statement/" target="_blank"><stron