German Feb import slump outpaces fall in exports

A sharp drop in Germany's imports in February outpaced a fall in exports, leading to a higher trade surplus than economists expected, preliminary data from the Federal Statistics Office showed on Wednesday.

Imports fell 4.2 percent in seasonally adjusted terms, compared with a forecast of a decline of 2.0 percent month-on-month. Exports dropped 0.7 percent, compared with the 3.7 percent fall expected.

That led to a trade surplus of 8.9 billion euros ($11.74 billion) for the month, although January's figure was revised down to 6.8 billion euros from the 8.3 billion originally reported, underlining weakness in the export sector.

"We must therefore talk about a very marked slump in exports. Global trade has really caved in in recent months," said economist Juergen Michels at Citigroup. "It looks as though the recession got worse in the first quarter. The economy should have contracted by around 2.5 percent — due to the slump in exports and investment."

January's export figures were revised down to show a month-on-month fall of 7.4 percent compared with a drop of 4.4 percent previously reported.

As the world's largest exporter of goods, Germany enjoyed robust foreign demand for its engineering products until the economic downturn took hold last year and sent the export-orientated economy sharply into reverse.

Last month the BGA trade association forecast German exports will fall by up to 15 percent this year.

Highlighting the slowdown in trade, Hamburg-based logistics company HHLA said last week it saw 2009 container shipping volumes declining sharply on routes between Asia and Europe as well as to and from the Baltic region.

"For the first time since the container was introduced more than 40 years ago, the global container handling volume appears likely to decrease," said HHLA, which ships containers in and out of Hamburg, Europe's second-biggest port after Rotterdam in terms of the number of containers put through.