Manufacturing (Germany):
Demand boom continues

The surveyed manufacturers judged their current business situation again more positively than in the previous month. The improvement was especially marked among capital goods producers while the manufacturers of consumer durable goods reported a slight decline after the sudden surge in the previous month. On average, incoming orders and production continue to expand, with order reserves exceeding normal levels. In some instances supply bottlenecks arose. The business expectations reflected increasing confidence; the optimism with regard to future export business is unbroken. Although production plans are not as frequently expansive, for the first time in many months the enterprises that plan to hire new staff are in the majority. Price increases are expected to continue in the coming months, especially for intermediate products and consumer durable goods. The business situation in eastern German manufacturing was assessed by more firms as favourable, as the order situation continued to improve. With regard to the business outlook, the enterprises no longer expressed as much optimism as in the previous month, but they placed more hopes in export business. Here too increases in production were seldom, but the employment situation is likely to improve further according to the survey responses.