West Germany's Ifo business climate index, climbing to 96.1 in October after stagnating at 95.4 in September, confirmed that Europe's largest economy was steaming ahead and had only taken a breather the previous month.

Separately, the European Central Bank governing council, which yesterday held its first deliberations after raising interest rates by 0.5 of a percentage point on November 4th, kept interest rates steady as expected, with the key refinancing rate unchanged at 3 per cent.