Netherlands: Business confidence declines markedly in August

The producer confidence indicator, which measures Dutch manufacturers’ sentiment, decreased considerably from July’s 5.1 to 1.2 in August, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). This is the worst result since September 2014 but it remains above the 0-point threshold that separates optimistic from pessimistic sentiment.

According to the CBS, the deterioration reflected that producers had become less positive regarding order books and stocks of finished products and slightly negative about future output. In terms of specific sectors, producers of transport equipment remained the most negative, while producers in the textiles, clothes and leather industry were by far the most optimistic.

For 2016, FocusEconomics Consensus Forecast panelists see fixed investment growing 5.6%, which is up 0.7 percentage points from last month’s forecast. For 2017, the panel expects fixed investment to expand 3.2%.