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We use data on mobility from two sources, Apple and Google. The former is a broader measure of mobility, encompassing a more complete range of activities including walking. The latter provides an indication of economic activity – tracking workplace, retail and transit movements We track them across 50 countries. Notable changes this week are:
- In DM, Portugal, Greece, Italy and the UK have seen the most significant increases in mobility (Chart 1). This is the second consecutive weekly jump in mobility for Greece and Italy, and comes on the back of a significant rise in flights to holiday destinations. Despite the rise in mobility, Portugal and the UK are among the lowest on the list of developed countries (see table below).
- Scandinavian countries continue to post relatively high mobility index values. The pandemic Apple mobility score average for Finland, Norway and Sweden is 181, compared to 125 for the full sample of countries.
- Belgium and Japan experienced weekly declines in both Apple and Google mobility values. For Belgium, this seems to be part of a longer term fall (see graphs below). Both countries are struggling with increases in new daily coronavirus cases. Japan has also seen a weekly drop off in flight departures.
- On aggregate, Apple mobility has fallen relative to the previous week, potentially indicative of concerns over second waves. Google mobility, our proxy of economic activity, is up marginally on last week.
- Both Apple and Google indices are up, on average, for our list of developing and newly industrialised countries. The largest weekly increases are in India, Malaysia, Thailand and South Africa.
- For a second consecutive week, Hong Kong has seen the most significant fall in mobility across our sample. Mobility is down by approximately 9% on last week, as the country grapples with the ongoing coronavirus crisis.
- Chile and Argentina have the lowest mobility values relative to pre-lockdown levels. Both are recording index scores of less than 50% of levels seen in early February.
For more details on what information the tables and charts in this report represent, see the final bullet point in previous editions.
Bilal Hafeez is the CEO and Editor of Macro Hive. He spent over twenty years doing research at big banks – JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank, and Nomura, where he had various “Global Head” roles and did FX, rates and cross-markets research.
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