Eurozone annual inflation is expected to be 4.0% in June 2008 - the highest since May 1992, according to a flash estimate issued by Eurostat, the Statistical Office of the European Union. It was 3.7% in May.

Markets news on stocks, currencies and commodities.

British house builder Taylor Wimpey said it is looking to raise additional equity to help withstand “a significant downturn” in the U.K. property market.

UK consumer confidence fell in June to the lowest level since the London poll tax riots that preceded Margaret Thatcher’s ouster as Prime Minister in 1990, as house prices fell across the nation.

Advances in technology have profoundly changed how businesses operate over the past two decades. The transformation has been so dramatic that corporate leaders could be forgiven for thinking that the next few years will bring a respite. But a new Economist Intelligence Unit report suggests the opposite—looking five years ahead, corporate leaders expect technological innovation to remain an enormous influence on their business. Operations, the supply chain and sales and marketing will all benefit from continuing technology advances. But the real story in the next five years will be the impact on relationships with the customer. By 2013, technology will have increased the latter’s influence to a level hard to imagine today.

Principal news stories from the Irish Independent, Irish Times, Irish Examiner, Financial Times and New York Times.

Irish Economy: In the week that the Economic and Social Research Institute forecast the first Irish recession in 25 years, Taoiseach Brian Cowen refused to acknowledge such an outcome while the principal Irish business lobby group IBEC called for a public pay freeze but was reticent about key other influencers on competitiveness.

KB Home’s quarterly loss nearly doubled as prices fell amid a continuing housing downturn and credit crisis.

The European Commission has cleared under the EU Merger Regulation the proposed acquisition of Horizon Technology Group of Ireland by the US-based company Avnet, both distributors of information technology products. The Commission concluded that the concentration would not significantly impede effective competition in the European Economic Area (EEA) or any substantial part of it.

Taxation trends in the EU:
The weighted tax-to-GDP ratio (i.e. the total amount of taxes and
social security contributions) in the EU27 increased to 39.9% in
2006 from 39.3% in 2005. The EU27 tax ratio is nevertheless lower than in 1996
(40.3%) and the peak of 41.0% in 1999. The downtrend which had started in 1999
in most Member States stopped in 2005. In 2006, the overall tax ratio in the
Eurozone (EA15) was 40.5%, up from 39.8% in 2005. Since 1996, taxes
in the Eurozone have followed a similar trend to the EU27, although at a
slightly higher level.