The Industrial Production Index fell 4.0% in August, compared to the same month a year earlier, after a 2.8% drop in July, according to data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) released today.
According to INE, excluding the energy grouping, the aggregate index fell by 5.2%, compared to a contraction of 3.3% in the previous month.
Among the major industrial groupings, the variations were divergent. While on the one hand energy and investment goods showed positive variations, the negative developments in intermediate goods and consumer goods penalized the aggregate.
Intermediate goods made the most significant contribution to the total index (-2.8 percentage points), due to a rate of change of -8.3% (-5.6% in the previous month), while consumer goods contributed -1.9 p.p. to the aggregate, as a result of a year-on-year reduction of 5.5% (-3.0% in July).
The energy and investment goods groupings showed positive variations of 2.5% and 2.0% respectively (-0.5% and 1.6% in the previous month), with contributions of 0.4 p.p. and 0.3 p.p..
In terms of month-on-month change, the Industrial Production Index rose by 0.7% in August, compared to 0.6% in July.
The capital goods and energy groupings contributed 1.5 p.p. and 0.5 p.p. respectively to the growth of the total index, as a result of rates of change of 9.9% and 3.2% (-2.3% and 4.2% in the previous month).
The consumer goods and intermediate goods groupings made contributions of -0.9 p.p. and -0.5 p.p., due to monthly variations of -2.6% and -1.4% (0.2% and 0.5% in July).
