Polish industrial production surprises on the rise with growth of 7.8% yoy in October

Polish industrial production rose 7.8% year-on-year at constant prices in October, after increasing 8.8% year-on-year the previous month, according to unadjusted data from the GUS statistical office. 22 november.

The expansion far exceeded consensus, which expected a gain of only 5.4% yoy. This good result is explained by the very dynamic growth of the utilities sector – production of electricity, gas, steam and hot water – which jumped 40.6% year-on-year in the tenth month, probably in due to the increase in electricity exports, analysts said. .

“Excluding the electricity production factor, the overall situation of the industry in October is broadly similar to that observed in recent months”, Millennium Bank said in a commentary on GUS figures.

“Polish industry has coped with supply chain difficulties better than other European countries due to a relatively lower dependence on foreign suppliers and a lower share of the most important industries. affected by this problem ” Millennium Bank also said.

Seasonally adjusted, industrial production rose 9.8% yoy in October after expanding 8.7% yoy in September. The monthly reading showed an unadjusted gain of 2.3% (+ 11% mth in September) and also a gain of 2% after adjustment (+ 0.9% in September).

Broken down by main segments, production rose 5.5% yoy unadjusted (+ 7.9% in September) in the manufacturing sector. Production also increased 10.7% year-on-year in water supply and waste management, decreasing 1pp from the previous month.

Production increased by 2.4% yoy (+ 7.8% in September) in mines and quarries.

Overall, production increased in 25 of 34 industry segments in October in annual terms, up from 30 in September. Auto production continued to suffer from a component shortage, with segment output declining 19.5% year-on-year.

“Today’s data surprised on the upside and bodes well for fourth quarter GDP growth,” Erste said.

“Nonetheless, in the rest of the year, we could see some slowdown in industrial production growth, due to persistent supply side problems as well as the deteriorating pandemic situation,” added the Austrian bank.

The number of people quarantined reached a new high and stood at more than 500,000 last week, which could force some companies to limit their operations due to lack of manpower.

Looking beyond 2021, the outlook for the industry is broadly favorable, with companies indicating they expect orders and production to increase, according to Millennium Bank.

Poland suffered a 2.7% pandemic recession in 2020, one of the lightest contractions in Europe. The country’s GDP is expected to increase sharply, around 5% in 2021. The explosion in the number of new cases of COVID-19 (coronavirus) remains a risk factor, however.

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