German unemployment fell more than expected in October, pushing down the jobless rate in Europe's biggest economy to a record low, data from the Federal Labour Office showed on Wednesday.
'Autumn pickup'
"Due to the autumn pickup, unemployment fell significantly, employment rose again and demand for new staff increased further," Frank-Juergen Weise, head of the Federal Labour Office, said.
The seasonally adjusted jobless total fell by 13,000 to 2.662 million, the Labour Office said. That compared with a consensus forecast in a Reuters poll for unemployment to fall by only 1,000.
Lowest level since reunification
The adjusted unemployment rate edged down 0.1 percentage point to 6.0 percent, the lowest level since German reunification in 1990.
The number of job vacancies also hit a record high of 691,000, suggesting companies are increasingly struggling to find new staff quickly on the labor market.