Germany Industrial Orders Rise More Than Expected; Retail Sales Growth Accelerates

Germany’s industrial orders grew more than expected in January underpinned by robust foreign demand and retail turnover growth accelerated on non-food sales, data from Destatis revealed on Monday.

Industrial orders expanded 1.8 percent month-on-month, faster than the economists’ forecast of +1.0 percent but slower than the December’s 3.0 percent increase.

The slowdown was caused by the 8.3 percent decrease in domestic orders. Meanwhile, foreign demand was up 9.4 percent. New orders from the non-euro area surged 17.0 percent, while demand from the euro area fell 2.6 percent.

Manufacturers of capital goods logged a monthly growth of 5.5 percent. On the other hand, orders for intermediate goods declined 2.6 percent and that of consumer goods by 4.6 percent.

Excluding major orders, new orders in manufacturing gained 0.8 percent in January.

At the same time, the annual increase in orders improved to 7.3 percent from 5.9 percent in the previous month.

Further, data showed that manufacturing turnover grew 1.8 percent on month taking the annual growth to 2.9 percent in January.

In a separate communiqué, the statistical office said retail sales advanced 10.3 percent year-on-year in January, following a 0.8 percent rise each in December and November. Sales were forecast to climb 9.8 percent.

Destatis said the strong increase in sales compared to the same month last year is partly due to the partial lockdown in January 2021.

Data showed that many consumers preferred larger purchases, such as furniture, to December 2020 due to the temporary reduction in VAT in the second half of 2020.

Food, beverages and tobacco sales dropped 5.6 percent, while non-food sales surged 22.8 percent from the last year.

On a monthly basis, retail turnover rebounded 2.0 percent after falling 4.6 percent in December. Economists had forecast an increase of 1.8 percent.

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