Economy in Brief: August 2026

German orders in June rose by 3.1%, after a 0.3% crawl higher in May and a sharp 3.2% decline in April. Domestic orders have been gradually building a head of steam after falling 2.4% in April; they rose by 1.3% in May and surged by 7.8% in June. Over the same timeline, there was a 3.8% decline in foreign orders in April; that decline was trimmed to 0.3% in May and became a tiny 0.2% increase in June. In all cases, there was a progression from relatively deep negative numbers in April in the wake of the start of the attacks on Iran. That weakness led to stabilization and a moderate increase in May, and then to a lot more strength in June as markets and economies became hopeful that the Iran war was winding down as both parties seemed to be getting slightly punch-drunk.

Sequential Growth Patterns The progression of orders from 12 months to six months to three months is not clean, with a lack of overall trend for orders. Foreign orders move to progressive weakness from 12 months to six months to three months. Domestic orders are somewhat chaotic in their pattern but show a 13.5% increase over 12 months and an explosive 29.6% annual rate increase over three months. The foreign orders series is weak and somewhat concerning, but the domestic order series maintains quite reassuring growth over 12 months and three months.

Quarter-to-Date Orders In quarter-to-date (QTD), the data are now complete even if they are preliminary, with total orders rising 5.8%, foreign orders rising 6.9%, and domestic orders rising 3.8%, all at annual rates. The queue standings on the levels of orders as of June show strong 85-to-90-percentile levels of activity for total orders and foreign orders, with domestic orders coming in at a milder, but still above-median 64.1 percentile standing. When we rank orders in terms of their year-over-year growth rates, total orders have a 73.0 percentile standing, with foreign orders at a 52.5 percentile standing and domestic orders at a 93.0 percentile mark. The growth performance favors domestic orders, but the level of orders that is being achieved is better for foreign compared to domestic orders using historic comparison standards.

Sales/Real Sector Sales Turning to sales, we find them somewhat more erratic in June, showing a decline for manufacturing overall, with all manufacturing sectors showing month-to-month drops except consumer durables where sales have a 2.5% gain. Manufacturing sales in real terms rose by 0.2%, with mixed sector performance. In April, all sales made a 0.1% gain in real terms amid convoluted sector patterns. The sequential performance of retail sales by sector shows the overall trend is progressively weakening, with all manufacturing sales falling by 0.4% over 12 months, by 0.8% at an annual rate over six months, and by 3.7% at an annual rate over three months. Sales decline for all categories over three months, for most categories over six months, and for all categories over 12 months. The sales picture is not particularly healthy, but fortunately that's a look back at what consumers and businesses have done, while, presumably, the orders data are more robust and looking ahead. The queue standing levels for real sales are quite weak. In fact, for manufacturing, the overall ranking is just above 50% at a 50.9 percentile standing. Capital goods have a very strong 71.8 percentile standing. Intermediate goods have a standing just short of their median at a 45.8 percentile. But real sales for consumer goods, consumer durables, and consumer nondurables are extremely weak, in the bottom 10-percentile standing or even weaker. Turning to rankings based upon the pace of sales on year-over-year data, all of the metrics for real sector sales are below the 50% mark, which means they are below their respective medians for the period. However, the rankings are generally clustered around a 40-percentile standing, which is moderately weak, within roughly 10 percentile points of the median. While not encouraging, it's not devastating.

Industrial Confidence in Europe Industrial confidence measures for Germany, France, Italy, and Spain, providing a quick look at the large countries in the European Monetary Union, showed negative readings in June for all the countries, with slight progress made in June compared to May in three of the four countries (France being the exception showing slippage). The averages over 36 months and 12 months again show consistently negative numbers, with very little change over three months compared to 12 months. The rankings of the industrial confidence readings, which are diffusion indexes from the EU, show only Spain with a ranking above its 50-percentile, putting it above its past median. However, France has a 44.3 percentile standing, which is close to the median; Italy has a 37.8 percentile standing; and Germany has the lowest standing at its 32.1 percentile.

The total or composite PMIs in July released by S&P showed mixed performance although the average and median readings for the 25 reporters improved slightly month-to-month. The average reading rose to 52 in July from 51.3 in June, and the median reading rose to 52.2 from 50.8.

Contraction is mostly avoided, but not rare In July, seven of the reporters showed total PMI gauges below 50, indicating that those economies are contracting. The seven economies with that characteristic are France, Russia, Brazil, Zambia, Ghana, Egypt, and Qatar. For the most part, these are smaller economies. France, of course, is a large European economy; Russia is engaged in its ongoing war with Ukraine, which is taking a toll on its economy; and Brazil is one of the large BRIC economies.

The contracting count worsened, then stopped In June, nine countries had PMIs below 50, the same as in May. Over broader periods, such as three months, 10 countries show PMI values averaging below 50. That compares to seven over six months and six over 12 months. The slippage has actually progressed from 12 months to six months to three months, then improved on monthly data.

Contraction seems more structural than cyclical The shaded parts of the table correspond to PMI values below 50. We see that there's a long string of those readings in France, Russia, Egypt, and Qatar. For those countries, the one-month appearance of a below-50 reading in July was not episodic; it was structural. Germany has had two months in a row and a three-month average below 50; however, Germany turned stronger in July. The European Monetary Union as a whole had two months below 50 as well as very weak three-month and six-month averages, but it also turned higher in July. Zambia has a recent string of ongoing weakness; Ghana has a nearly unbroken streak of values below 50 as well. Brazil’s signal is like a flashing light.

There is good news However, the good news is that only eight of the reporting areas actually got weaker month-to-month in July, compared to nine in June and 11 in May. Over three months, we see 13 areas reporting PMIs that have weakened month-to-month. That compares to 21 that weakened over six months. On year-over-year comparisons, only 11 are weaker period-to-period. The weakening trend is much reduced in the recent monthly data.

Lingering weakness PMIs chronicle a great deal of lingering weakness, although for the most part conditions aren't worsening month-to-month over the past two months. However, there are a number of areas where activity, as designated by the PMI values, is declining. The sequential readings confirm that the growing weakness is a real factor and has only reversed in the last two months, if that result can be durable. How much of this weakness and subsequent rebound is linked to the war in Ukraine and the new deterioration and stalemate in the Middle East; those up-and-down dynamics are going to be hard to puzzle out.

Activity and performance assessments The queue percentile standings show that 12 of the 25 reporting entities have standings below their medians on data back to January 2021. That means nearly half are weaker in July than they have been on readings back to January 2021. On that timeline, conditions have not been strong, with an average diffusion (PMI) reading across the board of 52.3 and a median of 51.4. It has been a low-growth period in general.

The rich get richer? Even if only slowly... The large, developed economies, for the most part, have PMI rankings and queue standings above their 50th percentiles. The exception is the United Kingdom, with a 47.8 percentile standing. The exceptions also include the BRIC countries: Russia having a 26.9 percentile standing, India with an exceptionally low 9.0 percentile standing, Brazil with an 11.9 percentile standing, and China with a 22.4 percentile standing.