German industry received significantly fewer orders in August.

New business was 2.4 percent weaker than in July, mainly due to the lack of large orders, as the Federal Statistical Office announced on Thursday.

Economists surveyed by the Reuters news agency had only expected a decline of 0.7 percent.

Surprisingly, growth of 1.9 percent was enough in July, which means that the previously determined decline of 1.1 percent was corrected significantly.

The statistical office justified this unusually strong revision with "late reports of large orders from abroad in the field of aerospace".

A cooling global economy, a shortage of materials and above all the energy crisis are currently affecting the industry.

"The industrial economy is showing clear signs of slowing down against the background of the war and the high gas prices," commented the Federal Ministry of Economics on the development.

"The subdued outlook for the rest of the year is also reflected in a cooled business climate and cautious export expectations."

Consumer goods are growing against the trend

Domestic orders fell by 3.4 percent in August, and those from abroad by 1.7 percent.

While demand from the euro zone fell by 3.8 percent, new business with the rest of the world shrank only slightly by 0.4 percent.

Orders for capital goods such as machines, vehicles and systems fell by 2.4 percent this time.

The manufacturers of intermediate goods saw a decline of 4.2 percent.

By contrast, orders for consumer goods grew by 5.2 percent.

Despite the downturn in new business, the order books of German industrial companies are fuller than ever.

The reason: in addition to high energy costs, the continuing shortage of primary products leads to problems when processing orders.

"The still high stocks of unprocessed orders are threatened by cancellations and only provide a false sense of security," warned Commerzbank chief economist Jörg Krämer.

"The German economy is facing a difficult winter half-year: I expect a recession more than ever, even if gas rationing were avoided."