Getting Europe moving again
Several countries continue to ease restrictions and are now focusing on restarting economies. However, exiting from lockdown will be more challenging than entering. Visits to workplaces and transit stations remain below normal levels.
Towards a shallow recovery
While the short-term market focus seems to be on improving macroeconomic data, activity remains far lower than normal. For most advanced economies, we do not expect GDP to return to pre-Covid levels until the end of 2021 at the earliest.
Strong shock on foreign investment
Foreign investment experienced a bigger shock than domestic investment, particularly from Americas, Middle East, Asia Pacific while European investment showed more resilience. Mega deals were also negatively impacted by the lockdowns.
Office take-up deeply impacted
Take-up dropped significantly, as H1 2020 was the weakest H1 since 2009 in Europe. However, whereas some markets such as Central London and Central Paris saw the volumes falling dramatically, others proved more resilient such as in Germany.
Resilience of the logistics market
Unlike during the 2009 GFC, occupier market fundamentals are healthy with low vacant space and strong demand boosted by Ecommerce. The investment market maintains high volumes, and despite a slowdown, investor appetite is not fading.
