German factory orders rose in line with forecasts in February

According to provisional results of the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), real (price adjusted) new orders increased by a seasonally and calendar adjusted 1.2% in February 2021 compared with January 2021. Excluding major orders, real new orders in manufacturing were 1.5% higher than in the previous month.

Compared with February 2020, which was the month before restrictions were imposed due to the corona pandemic in Germany, real new orders increased by a calendar adjusted 5.6% in February 2021.

Domestic orders increased by 4.0% and foreign orders decreased by 0.5% in February 2021 on the previous month. New orders from the euro area went up 2.7%, and new orders from other countries decreased by 2.3% compared with January 2021.

In February 2021, the manufacturers of intermediate goods saw new orders increase by 0.5% compared with January 2021. The manufacturers of capital goods saw an increase of 2.1% on the previous month. Regarding consumer goods, new orders fell by 1.9%.

For January 2021, the revision of the preliminary outcome and the annual update of the seasonal factors resulted in an increase of 0.8% compared with December 2020 (provisional: +1.4).