FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Growth in euro zone corporate lending jumped last month to its fastest rate since the global financial crisis while a key money supply indicator eased, the European Central Bank said on Tuesday.
With the euro zone economy on its best growth run in a decade, the ECB decided last month to cut stimulus, arguing that recovery is now broad-based and increasingly self-sustaining, supported by both consumption and corporate spending.
Lending growth to non-financial corporations, a key plank in the recovery, rose to 2.9 percent in October from 2.4 percent a month ago, hitting its highest rate since mid-2009, ECB data showed.
Household lending growth was meanwhile unchanged at 2.7 percent.
Although lending growth is trending around its best level since the global financial crisis, it remains well below its pre-crisis mark as banks, under pressure to repair their balance sheets, are still reluctant to lend to the real economy.
The annual growth rate of the M3 measure of money supply, seen by some as a precursor of economic activity, slowed to 5.0 percent in October from 5.2 percent a month earlier, below expectations for 5.1 percent.