Germany - Recovery in demand is still a long time coming

The January figures for incoming industrial orders have once again put a noticeable damper on hopes of an imminent upturn in German industrial production. It is less important that incoming orders fell by 7% overall compared to December. This is because this overall figure has been determined for several months by strong fluctuations in the volume of large orders, which are usually only processed with a considerable time lag and then over a longer period of time, meaning that they have little influence on the short-term development of production. It is rather disappointing that the core figure excluding large orders also fell significantly by 2.7% in January compared to the previous month, meaning that the hopes of a gradual recovery in demand raised by the good December figure have not been fulfilled.

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