Eurozone retail sales just slumped unexpectedly for the second month running

It's a whopper of a day for European economic data.First, we got some miserable but widely expected news from Franceunemployment has reached its highest level in nearly two decades, and it's now above the European average.Secondly, service sector purchasing managers' index (PMI) business surveys were slightly worse than expected in November.The main event is the European Central Bank's policy decisionat 12:45 p.m. GMT (7:45 a.m. ET), followed by the press conference 45 minutes later. But before then, we've got eurozone retail saleswhich were worse than expected. Sales declined by 0.1% from September, the second unexpected dip in a row.Analysts were expecting an increase of 0.2% month-on-month, and for sales to be up by 2.7% year-on-year. The year-on-year figure actually came in at 2.5%.You can see the general improvement in retail sales since the eurozone exited its recession in mid-2013 on this chart from Eurostatbut you can also see a bit of a dip over the last few months. It's not yet clear whether that's going to be a sustained dip, or just a brief wobble:Join the conversation about this storyNOW WATCH: What you need to know before going into business with family
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