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German exports jump on Chinese demand
本帖最後由 peter236 於 2010-8-16 13:30 編輯
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8283fb ... e-00144feab49a.html
By Gerrit Wiesmann in Berlin and Daniel Schaefer and Ralph Atkins in Frankfurt
Published: July 8 2010 10:10 | Last updated: July 8 2010 14:21
German exports surged and industrial production showed big gains in May, with many of the country’s manufacturers singling out China as the driver of what seems to be an ever-faster recovery of Europe’s largest economy.
“We’re seeing a pick-up in Chinese domestic demand,” said Hans-Jochen Beilke, head of Ebm-Papst, which makes ventilators and electric motors. “The Chinese are buying more and more fridges, dryers and cars.”
Daimler, the German carmaker, reported this week that its car sales in China reached 13,700 units last month, a 177 per cent year-on-year surge that helped lift global sales of its Mercedes and Smart brands by 13 per cent.
Mr Beilke said some sectors seemed to be “overheating” and that German exports might not continue to grow at their current pace. But, with demand increasing in other markets, recovery could keep going for a year or two, he said.
Industrial production rose 2.6 per cent in May, extending a 1.2 per cent gain a month earlier, with the economics ministry in Berlin reporting “above average growth rates” in the metal-working and carmaking sectors.
Seasonally adjusted exports rose 9.2 per cent against the previous month – almost as fast as the 10.8 per cent gain in March, the fastest month-on-month rise seen by the statistical office since the early 1990s.
In April, exports fell 6.3 per cent but that figure now appears to have been an anomaly. “Although the figures are very volatile, the trend in foreign trade is still clearly upwards,” said Simon Junker at Commerzbank.
A chart on German exportsEconomists also took comfort from a surge in imports, which rose 14.8 per cent in May compared with April. Andreas Rees at Unicredit said this suggested “underlying momentum in the industrial sector is still strong”.
Since May last year, when continental Europe was in the midst of its worst recession since the second world war, German exports have risen 28.8 per cent – and those to markets outside the European Union by 39.5 per cent.
Such trends do not make everyone happy, however. Europe and the US remain Germany’s largest export markets, but some worry that German manufacturing might be becoming too dependent for growth on China at a time when the euro is again gaining strength.
“Without China we would hardly have seen this recovery – it’s a frightening trend,” said Hannes Hesse, managing director of the VDMA engineering association. Demand for textile machines was “almost exclusively” Chinese.
“Demand?” said Diether Klingelnberg, chairman of Klingelnberg, a maker of machine tools based near Cologne. “It’s China, China, China by a long way, then India, Brazil, then Russia – and the US remains weak, as do many of our European markets.”
He cautioned that the upswing German industry was seeing was “not supported by broad shoulders” across the globe.
Some economists have warned that a slowdown in global economic growth could curb German growth in coming months. Many already expect gross domestic product growth to slow from 2 per cent or more this year to 1.5 per cent in 2011.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010. |
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發表於 2010-8-16 13:26
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