Euro zone factory output fell in June as Germany, the bloc’s industrial powerhouse, faltered amid supply bottlenecks, European Union estimates released on Thursday showed.
The EU’s statistics office Eurostat said industrial output in the 19 countries sharing the euro fell 0.3% month-on-month, more than the 0.2% decline forecast by economists polled by Reuters.
The drop followed a 1.1% fall in May, which Eurostat on Thursday revised downward. It had previously estimated a 1.0% decline.
The fall in production was largely due to Germany’s unexpected decline in output which Eurostat estimated at 1.0% on the month, less than the 1.3% fall calculated last week by the country’s Federal Statistics Office .
Germany’s fall was partly offset by production increases in France and Italy, which recorded respectively a 0.4% and 1.0% rise on the month.
The euro zone indicator was driven down also by a 1.5% drop in the output of capital goods, like machinery, which for a second straight month was the worst performing sector in the bloc’s industry, pointing possibly to lower output in the future.
Production of energy fell by 0.6% month-on-month, whereas output of non-durable consumer goods, such as clothes and foodstuffs, went up 1.6%, rebounding from a 1.8% fall in May.
Production of intermediate and durable consumer goods each rose by 0.1%.
On the year, output in the euro zone rose in June by 9.7%, as the bloc continued its recovery from the massive output drops caused by the pandemic last year.
But the rise was smaller than forecast by economists, who had predicted a 10.4% increase, and was also less than half the 20.6% surge recorded in May.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Francesco Guarascio)