By Geoffrey Smith
Investing.com -- The bad news from the German economy hasn't stopped yet.
Statistics office Destatis said incoming orders, the most forward-looking of its hard data, fell by 5.3% from October, as businesses cut back on orders for big-ticket items in particular. Export orders fell particularly sharply, by 8.1%, and orders from the Eurozone the sharpest of all, down 10.3%. By contrast, domestic demand held up better, with orders falling only 1.1%.
Destatis also revised down October's numbers to show a rise of only 0.6%, rather than the 0.8% initially reported. That goes against the usual pattern of upward revisions from Destatis. Orders, which have fallen steadily throughout the year, are now running at their lowest level in over two years.
The numbers are the latest to reflect the slowdown across most of the country's major export markets, a trend also evidenced in the sharp narrowing of the U.S. trade deficit at the end of last year.
The news from the consumer sector was somewhat better, however. Retail sales volumes rose by 1.1% in November, a little more than expected, after a long-awaited government package aimed at cushioning the blow of surging energy prices led households to relax a little. Even so, sales were still down 5.9%, adjusted for inflation, from a year earlier.