If official estimates on Friday corroborate those of the NIESR, they'll show that real GDP grew by 0.7 per cent in Q3, after 0.9 per cent in Q2. Thursday's retail sales numbers will be consistent with this. They could show that sales rose by around 0.4 per cent in Q3 after 1.6 per cent growth in Q2, because falling real wages and slower employment growth are holding back demand.
We'll see a big reason for the UK slowdown on Thursday, with the release of purchasing manager surveys for the euro area. These might show that manufacturing activity is now contracting again, and that the service sector is growing only slowly. This picture could be confirmed by Friday's National Bank of Belgium business climate indicator, which could fall to a 14-month low; this has traditionally been a good barometer of conditions in the euro area generally.
Weakness in the euro area threatens not just to hold back UK exports, but also capital spending, to the extent that it depresses expectations of future demand and profits.
We'll see what the Bank of England's monetary policy committee makes of this when it releases minutes of its recent meeting on Wednesday. It is unlikely to be worried by the slowdown in itself, as this is long expected. However, signs of a relapse in the euro area and of low inflation - not just below-target CPI inflation but also low wage growth and falling commodity prices - make it unlikely that any member joined Martin Weale and Ian McCafferty in voting for a rate rise.
Elsewhere, the most significant news could be Wednesday’s US consumer price numbers. These could show that inflation has fallen since the spring - to around 1.7 per cent on both the headline and core measure (which excludes food and energy). Falling commodity prices and still-low wage growth are behind this. Such news will remind us that there’s no rush for the Fed to raise interest rates.
The UK’s public finance numbers will also be worth noting. These could show that public sector net borrowing between April and September was higher this year than last (£53.1bn). This could fuel talk that borrowing for the year as a whole will overshoot the OBR's £86.6bn forecast. One reason for this is that the economic upturn hasn't raised tax revenues as much as hoped.
