Madrid - The euro area's economy emerged from a record-long recession in the second quarter, led by Germany and France, amid the first sustained period of financial-market calm since the start of the debt crisis.

Gross domestic product in the 17-nation euro area expanded 0.3 percent in the April-June period after a 0.3 percent contraction in the previous three months, the European Union's statistics office in Luxembourg said Wednesday. That exceeded the median estimate of 0.2 percent growth in a Bloomberg News survey of 41 economists. From a year earlier, the economy shrank 0.7 percent in the second quarter.

Germany and France, the euro area's two largest economies, both showed faster-than-projected expansions in the quarter. While the overall outlook has improved, the recession pushed the unemployment rate to a record and parts of southern Europe remain mired in a slump, with more than half of young people in Spain and Greece out of work.

"The upside surprise shows an underlying improvement in the euro zone as strong exports weakened the contraction in Spain and Italy and spurred growth in core countries, especially France," said Ricardo Santos, an economist at BNP Paribas in London. "We'll have to wait more to see any improvement in the labor market, but this shows the worst part of the recession is probably over."

In Germany, GDP increased 0.7 percent in the second quarter, more than the 0.6 percent gain forecast by economists. The French economy expanded 0.5 percent after two quarters of contraction. Still, at least four of the euro area's 17 member countries remain in recessions, including Italy and Spain.

"This slightly more positive data is welcome, but there is no room for any complacency whatsoever," EU Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn said in a blog post. "A sustained recovery is now within reach, but only if we persevere on all fronts of our crisis response."

The European Central Bank has cut interest rates to a record low and pledged to keep them there or lower for an "extended period" to bolster the economy. With the jobless rate at 12.1 percent, the highest since the euro's debut in 1999, ECB President Mario Draghi this month described progress as "tentative."

The International Monetary Fund last month cut its global growth projections, while the U.S. Treasury Department's top international official, Lael Brainard, said Europe faces the risk of prolonged economic stagnation unless policy makers encourage domestic demand. Euro-area unemployment has held at a record since March and almost a quarter of young people across the bloc are without jobs. The ECB forecasts that the euro economy will shrink 0.6 percent this year.

"The growth rates we're currently seeing are still far too low and we're seeing an increasing gap between financial and political hope on the one side and economic reality on the other," Stephen King, Britain-based chief global economist at HSBC Holdings, told Bloomberg Television on Aug. 12. "The problem is the gap between the growth that's being delivered and the growth that's required to make the fiscal numbers add up in the medium term."

While Europe's recovery inches forward, conditions in major export markets such as the United States and China are improving.