Natural gas and electricity outages hampered industrial production in
New orders continued to moderate in February amid market uncertainty and sharp price rises, the survey compilers added.
The PMI for February came in at 50.4, still above the 50.0 no-change threshold, but slightly lower than January’s 50.5.
“Firms continued to expand their staffing levels, however, amid efforts to improve capacity and keep on top of workloads despite the numerous supply headwinds. Meanwhile, the latest PMI data suggested that inflationary pressures may have peaked around the turn of the year, though cost increases remained sharp midway through the first quarter.”
New export orders expanded, while firms continued to make efforts to improve operating capacity by taking on additional staff,
Total new orders softened for the fifth month running, and to the greatest extent since May last year as price rises and market uncertainty deterred customers, it added, noting that this was despite a return to growth.
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