Berlin/Paris — There was good economic news from Germany and France on Friday. German growth accelerated in the first quarter, while the French economy continued to add jobs. The German economy’s acceleration was driven by higher investment in construction, machinery and equipment, robust household and state spending as well as strong exports, the Federal Statistics Office said on Friday. Europe’s biggest economy grew by 0.6% on the quarter in the January-March period after 0.4% in the final three months of 2016, the data showed. This was in line with the consensus forecast in a Reuters poll and the strongest quarterly growth rate since the first quarter of 2016 when the economy expanded by 0.7%. "Investments grew strongly. Due to the mild weather, investments in buildings as well as in equipment were significantly higher than in the fourth quarter of 2016," the office said in a statement. Private households and the state had increased their consumption expenditures slightly at the ...
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