German industry suffered a slump in orders in September.

The orders fell by 4.0 percent, as announced by the Federal Statistical Office on Friday.

Economists polled by the Reuters news agency had only expected a decline of 0.5 percent, after a revised 2.0 percent drop in August.

Without taking major orders into account, there was a decline of 3.9 percent in September.

Compared to the same month last year, incoming orders were even 10.8 percent lower after calendar adjustments.

"However, the volume of incoming orders in September 2021 was exceptionally high due to catch-up effects due to corona combined with a severe shortage of preliminary products," explained the Wiesbaden statisticians.

"The soaring order intake, which had set in after the corona pandemic in the course of catch-up effects, seems to have come to an end," added the Federal Ministry of Economics (BMWK).

Incoming orders are now back to the level they were before the Corona crisis.

According to the BMWK, the decline compared to the previous month was due to a slump in foreign demand: while domestic orders were still slightly up, incoming orders from abroad fell by 6.3 percent in the non-euro area and 8.0 percent in the euro area.

At industry level, strong declines in the two largest industrial sectors, motor vehicles (-9.0 percent) and mechanical engineering (-8.1 percent), hit the overall index.

"High energy prices and a lack of material continue to hamper production," commented Alexander Krüger, chief economist at the private bank Hauck Aufhäuser Lampe.

"The industry has been dragging along for a long time, times seem to be getting tougher."

The growing pessimistic attitude of many companies is also problematic.

For LBBW economist Jens-Oliver Niklasch, the fall in orders fits in with the early indicators, which indicated economic weakness in the fall.

The economic downward trend remains "unmistakable".

The sluggish world economy, lack of materials and above all the energy crisis are currently affecting the industry.

This is also shown by a company survey recently conducted by the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK): The energy crisis is affecting the economy across almost all sectors.

Material scarcity decreases slightly

However, according to the Ifo Institute, the shortage of materials decreased slightly in October.

63.8 percent of the companies surveyed by the Munich researchers reported bottlenecks, after 65.8 percent in September.

"The large order backlog in industry cannot be processed," said Ifo expert Klaus Wohlrabe on Friday.

From his point of view, that would be very important for supporting the economy at the moment.

In the automotive industry, the situation has defused somewhat, from 82.0 to 74.9 percent.

According to Ifo, the numbers remain similarly high in many sectors, such as manufacturers of electrical equipment (76.1 percent) and mechanical engineering (85.9 percent).

Beverage manufacturers reported a new record.

Here 79.1 percent are now affected, after 70.1.

In the energy-intensive sectors, the development was inconsistent.

While the share in the chemical industry rose from 44.9 to 49.1 percent, it fell from 41.7 to 35.3 percent in the glass and ceramics industry.

"This may be due to falling production," explained Ifo expert Wohlrabe.