Orders to the German manufacturing industry fell 25.8% in April over a month due to the coronavirus, said the Statistics Office on Friday. But they could start rising again in May.
This indicator, which gives a taste of manufacturing activity, has not had a worse month “since the start of the time series in January 1991”, according to Destatis, when large swathes of the leading European economy were stopped in April to slow the pandemic of new coronavirus.
Over a year, orders fell 36.6% in April, says Destatis.
The restrictions against the pandemic “were applied in most of the main countries (offering industrial outlets) throughout the month,” the economy ministry said in a statement.
But the gradual deconfinement measures mean that “the low point of the industrial recession has probably passed”, believes the ministry, while the factories gradually started to turn again in May.
The historical decline from March to April thwarted the expectations of the panel of economists polled by Factset, who expected a decline of 20% in one month, intervening after a fall corrected by Destatis of 15% in the month of March, against -15.6% initially announced.
Orders for capital goods, such as machinery, were particularly affected, down 30.6%.
Consumer goods and semi-finished goods fell by -11.4% and -22.7% respectively.
Orders from Germany fell 22.6% against 32.6% for the eurozone and 26.6% from abroad, says Destatis. The industry turnover fell by 11.5% over a month according to these seasonally adjusted data.
Germany could see its gross domestic product fall between April and June by 10%, unheard of for 50 years, according to the main German economic institutes, this after a decline of 2.2% in the first quarter.
Over the year, the downturn should be between 6 and 7%, according to a forecast corrected downwards by Lars Feld, chairman of the committee of economic wise men, in an interview Friday with the media group Funke.
The government coalition around Angela Merkel announced Wednesday evening a recovery plan of 130 billion euros for the years 2020 and 2021 intended to stimulate the German economy.
ats, awp, afp
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