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The crisis in Ukraine is beginning to hurt the German economy, with industrial orders, a key measure of demand for German-made goods, taking an unexpected hit in March, data showed on Wednesday, AFP reports.
After rising consistently for the preceding four months, industrial orders were down 2.8 percent month-on-month in March, the economy ministry said in a statement.
The ministry attributed the March decline to a sharp drop in foreign orders, particularly those coming from the Eurozone.
Overall export orders were down by as much as 4.6 percent with orders from the single currency area nose-diving by 9.4 percent.
The ministry insisted that the overall trend in industrial orders "remains pointing upwards, but is likely to tail off somewhat."
A contributing factor here would be a "temporary reluctance to place orders in view of the current geo-political developments," the ministry suggested.
"All in all, the upturn in the manufacturing sector will be driven by robust domestic demand and demand for industrial goods outside the euro area," it said.
UniCredit analyst Andrea Rees described the March data as an "unpleasant surprise."
While some technical correction had been in the pipeline after persistently upbeat figures in the previous few months, "
the drop was massive," Rees said.
But the expert insisted that the March data should not simply be taken at face value.
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