In total, Germany exported 130.6 billion euros in seasonally adjusted data (CVS), according to the German statistics office Destatis.
Compared to January 2022, exports, the pillar of German economic power, increased by 8.6%.
This increase "is not enough to offset the sharp drop in December", observe ING analysts, according to whom "exports have still not returned to the levels observed in April of last year".
"In the very near term, the continued weakening of export order books, the expected slowdown in the US economy, high inflation and high uncertainty will leave a clear mark on German exports," they said. even if the reopening of China is a good sign.
Sales of goods increased in January by 3.1% to the United States and by 1.4% to China, the country's largest economic partner.
Exports to European Union countries are up by 0.7%.
Exports to Russia, whose trade is targeted by numerous sanctions, jumped 12.3% in January over one month, even if their value of one billion euros places them very far from the 12.7 billion exported to the United States.
Imports from Russia, on the other hand, fell by 36.7%.
Last year, Germany mainly exported medicines to Russia, which rose from the rank of 15th to 23rd customer of the country.
Germany's imports in total fell by 3.4%, to 113.9 billion euros, with a more marked decline, of 6%, for China.
The trade balance is largely in surplus, at 16.7 billion euros in CVS data.
The energy crisis and inflation are weighing on the economic dynamism of Germany, whose GDP fell by 0.4% in the fourth quarter of 2022 and which expects a further contraction in activity in the first quarter.
The country saw its trade surplus shrink by more than half in 2022, weighed down by cost increases.
According to ING, "friction in the supply chain and a more fragmented global economy continue to undermine Germany's old formula for success" whose foreign trade is one of the engines of economic power.
© 2023 AFP