In May, German factory orders rose by 4.4% M/M, significantly stronger than the market had expected. The April outcome was slightly upwardly revised from 0.0% M/M to 0.1% M/M. The breakdown shows that the improvement was broad based and led by a 5.9% M/M increase in capital goods. Intermediate goods rose by 3.0% M/M and consumer goods by 2.6% M/M. Domestic orders rose by 3.9% M/M, while orders from abroad climbed an even stronger 5.2% M/M. This is the biggest in-crease in German factory orders since June 2007 and raises expectations that orders might have hit the trough.
Other: UK industrial production falls back in June
In the UK, industrial production dropped by 0.6% M/M in May, while the consensus was looking for a slight increase. The previous figure was downwardly revised from 0.3% M/M to 0.1% M/M. On a yearly basis, industrial production was down by 11.9% Y/Y in May. Looking at the details, manufacturing dropped by 0.5% M/M, mining & quarrying fell by 2.1% M/M and oil & gas declined by 1.8% M/M. Electricity, gas and water supply rose by 1.0% M/M in May. The outcome is a bit disappointing after the improvement last month and indicates that the “hard data” remain slug-gish despite the improvement in the confidence indicators.
