News from Germany: Economy Tumbled as Auto Industry Deteriorates for 5th Consecutive Month | World | News


The Ifo indicator for the German automotive sector fell to minus 1 point in December, after plus 7.9 in November. Oliver Falck, director of the Ifo Center for Industrial Organization and New Technologies, said: “This further deterioration is caused by the manufacturers, not the suppliers.”

The builders’ situation indicator fell sharply to 15.6 points, after 36.5 in November.

All manufacturers continue to be affected by preliminary product supply bottlenecks.

Foreign business seems to be stagnating.

The export expectations index fell to 28.1 points from 51.1 in November.

Mr. Falck added: “Manufacturers’ expectations aren’t so rosy anymore.”

Manufacturers’ business expectations fell from 42.7 points to 18.2 in December.

The situation with manufacturers has a direct impact on that of suppliers, which remains quite bad.

The indicator fell to minus 13.6 points, after minus 21.7 points in November, but remained clearly in negative territory.

Supplier business expectations are more pessimistic than they have been for nearly two years.

READ MORE: “Stop rewriting history!” SNP independence myth busted

Labor Office chief Detlef Scheele said: “The labor market developed well at the end of the year. The recovery of previous months continued.”

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 5.2%, the lowest since March 2020, when Germany entered its first coronavirus lockdown.

Scheele warned that a rise in COVID-19 cases and renewed restrictions to contain the spread of the disease were increasing uncertainties.

This was reflected in more companies signaling in December that they could soon furlough more workers again.

In October, the last month for which reliable data was available, the number of employees subject to job protection programs, also known as Kurzarbeit, fell to some 710,000.

That was down sharply from its peak of around six million reached in April 2020.

Additional reporting by Monika Pallenberg

Previous Robredo believes IT and business process management have the ability to drive the economy
Next Insect and hydroponic farming could boost food security and circular economy