The general business climate index for the agricultural machinery industry in Europe has again deteriorated slightly following the sharp downturn of the previous months. In March, the index decreased from -52 to -55 points (on a scale of -100 to +100).
The renewed deterioration in the business climate is this time solely due to the fact that current business evaluations have followed the already lower expectations downwards. According to the survey participants, current business is now worse than it has been for more than 7 years. Meanwhile, only 8% of industry representatives consider the current business situation to be favorable.
With regard to the coming six months, the outlook is rather gloomy as well. Once again two thirds of the survey participants expect their turnover to decline during this period. The need for investment seems to be exhausted in all European end-customer markets and there is not one single European market for which a majority of survey participants would have positive turnover expectations.
The outlook appears to be slightly better with a view to the year as a whole, particularly when considering the expectations for other regions of the world. A gradual stabilization can also be seen in expectations for the coming order intake (an indicator that is not included in the calculation of the overall barometer index). For the full year of 2024, the survey participants expect their company's turnover to decline in the single-digit range.
