Press release No. 047 of 6 February 2023

New orders in manufacturing:
December 2022 (in real terms, provisional):
+3.2% on the previous month (seasonally and calendar adjusted).
-10.1% on the same month a year earlier (calendar adjusted)

November 2022 (in real terms, revised):
-4.4% on the previous month (seasonally and calendar adjusted)
-10.2% on the same month a year earlier (calendar adjusted)

WIESBADEN – Real (price adjusted) new orders in manufacturing rose by 3.2% on a seasonally and calendar adjusted basis in December 2022 compared to November 2022, according to provisional results of the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). This largely compensated the significant decline in November 2022 (-4.4%). However, excluding large-scale orders, there was a 0.6% decline in December 2022. The current growth of new orders is therefore mainly due to large-scale orders, which have been especially high in the Manufacture of electricity distribution and control apparatus, Manufacture of engines and turbines, except aircraft, vehicle and cycle engines, and Manufacture of air and spacecraft and related machinery.

With a few exceptions, new orders fell continuously throughout 2022 and are therefore currently calendar adjusted 10.1% lower than in December 2021. The development throughout the last year is contrary to 2021, when new orders rose due to corona recovery effects. Overall, new orders are currently slightly above the pre-Corona level. In a calendar adjusted comparison, new orders are currently 1.2% higher than in December 2019.
At 5.7%, the current increase was particularly strong for domestic orders. At the same time, foreign orders also increased by 1.2%. In this context, new orders from the eurozone increased by 9.8%, while orders from the rest of the world decreased by 3.8%.

While new orders in the capital goods sector remained unchanged, orders in the main intermediate goods group increased by 9.7%. This was partially due to the aforementioned major orders for the Manufacture of electricity distribution and control apparatus. At the same time, new orders in the consumer goods sector decreased by 3.3%.

After revision of the preliminary results, November 2022 new orders was 4.4% lower than in October 2022 (preliminary figure: -5.3%).

Turnover decreased by 1.7% in comparison to the previous month

According to provisional figures, real turnover in manufacturing (seasonally and calendar adjusted) decreased by 1.7% in December 2022 compared to November 2022. For November 2022 revision of the preliminary figures resulted in an increase of 2.5% compared with October 2022 (provisional figure: +2.1%). Compared with December 2021, turnover was a calendar adjusted 1.9% higher.

Methodological note:

New orders and turnover are covered and evaluated in accordance to the Classification of Economic Activities, 2008 edition (WZ 2008). New orders are only reported in selected branches of manufacturing. The rates of change are based on the price adjusted indices of new orders and on turnover in manufacturing. The average outcome in the year 2015 is the basis of the index and fixed on 100 index points (2015 = 100). The data is calendar and seasonally adjusted by means of the X13 JDemetra+ method.

Further Information:

Detailed data and long time series are available from the GENESIS-Online database: indices of new orders (42151-0004) and indices of new orders excluding large-scale orders (42151-0008) and turnover indices (42152-0004).

A dossier on the Short-term indicator page of the Federal Statistical Office's website provides an analysis of the relationship between material shortages, new orders, production and prices in industry. Detailed information on production in energy-intensive industrial branchesis available on the Industry, manufacturing page.

New orders in manufacturing are available also in the Dashboard Germany (www.dashboard-deutschland.de) (only in german). This data portal of the Federal Statistical Office combines up-to-date indicators of official statistics and from other data providers on the topics of economy and finance as well as health and mobility. A tool also available there is the Economic Pulse Monitor (Pulsmesser für die Wirtschaft) (only in german). It can be used for real-time monitoring of the economic development.