Spanish unemployment shrinks at record rate in December Over the year, however, the ranks of the jobless surged by 426,364 people, or 9.6pc, the data showed. Engracia Hidalgo, Spain's labour minister, highlighted a slowdown in the rate of job cuts, however, saying the jobless queue had grown by 233,000 people in the second half of 2012 compared with 300,000 a year earlier. Mr Hidalgo said that analysts should "treat the December figures with caution and to closely follow the trend in the next months." A broader, quarterly household survey by the National Statistics Institute provides the official unemployment rate, which hit 25pc in the third quarter for the first time in modern Spanish history. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's government predicts that the unemployment rate will fall to 23.3pc in 2013. Separate data on Thursday showed that unemployment in Germany increased slightly in December to 6.7pc, from 6.5pc in November. The seasonally-adjusted jobless total was unchanged at 6.9pc, according to the Federal Labour Agency. The German economy is feeling the pull of the recession in Europe. Indicators suggest that gross domestic product shrank in real terms in the fourth quarter," said agency chief Frank-Juergen Weise. So far, the labour market has held up fairly robustly to the economic deterioration. But the slowdown is leaving its mark," he cautioned.