It however rose by 0.3 points at the yearly level and was 9.1 points higher than the long-term average, the Statistics Office said on Monday.

Lower confidence in manufacturing (-1.4 pp) was behind the monthly drop as the consumer confidence indicator did not affect the business indicator, and confidence in services, confidence in retail and confidence in construction all edged up by 0.3 points.

At the yearly level, the rise was fuelled by an improvement of confidence in construction (0.9 pp), services (0.5 pp) and retail (0.4 pp).

Consumer confidence and confidence in manufacturing, which were down 1 pp and 0.4 pp, respectively, ate away at the indicator at the yearly level.