PARIS (Reuters) - A timid recovery in French business activity extended into its fourth month in May as slowly improving demand at home and abroad helped the services and manufacturing sectors, a survey showed on Thursday.
Data compiler Markit said its preliminary composite purchasing managers index, surveying firms across the private sector, rose to 51.0 from 50.6 last month, moving further above the 50-point threshold between an expansion and contraction.
"There is a slow buildup in growth momentum, especially in the service sector where it's been wobbling around a little bit," Markit chief economist Chris Williamson told Reuters.
Markit's PMI index for service sector activity, which accounts for 55 percent of economic output, rose to 51.6 from 51.4 in April, falling slightly short of economists' average forecast for 51.9 as polled by Reuters.
Meanwhile, the index for the smaller manufacturing sector rose to 12-month high of 49.3 from 48.0, beating economists' forecast for 48.5, led by the first growth in export orders in over a year.
"A weaker euro is feeding through to the benefit of the industrial sector while at the same time it looks like the domestic economy is seeing consumers and businesses starting to spend more on services," Williamson said.
However, he said momentum was not strong enough for France to repeat the better-than-expected 0.6 percent economic growth it saw in the first three months of the year, forecasting a rate of "at best" of 0.3 percent in the second quarter.
Detailed PMI data are only available under licence from Markit and customers need to apply to Markit for a licence.