German Manufacturing Hits Slump in April

New data shows that orders from Germany’s manufacturers dropped in April as the result of fewer foreign orders, several news organizations reported.

On Monday, the German Federal Statistical Office released numbers showing a 2% decline n new orders in manufacturing from March. An ING-DiBA economist, Carsten Brzeski, told the Associated Press that the numbers “add to evidence of continued stagnation in the German industry.”

The ministry said that the decline in April was largely due to “extremely unsteady” orders of capital goods from customers outside of the Eurozone, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Federal Statistical Office also revised its numbers for orders in March to reflect a monthly increase of 2.6% from the previous figure of a 1.9% increase.  

The Journal noted that the number of total orders in Germany’s manufacturing sector increased by 2.4% compared to April 2015.