Industrial Output August 2007

Well, from time to time there is a bit of good news in Hungary. According to preliminary data released today by the Hungarian Statistics office industrial output was again up in August. The industrial gross output increased by 9.5% when compared with August 2006, while the working day adjusted index rose by 12.2%. The volume of output was 9% higher in the first eight months of 2007 than in the same period of the previous year. The volume of industrial production in August – according to seasonally and by working-day adjusted indices – was up on July by 0.9%.

Here are the charts. First the index itself (seasonally adjusted):



and here's the monthly year on year change chart:



As István Zsoldos from Goldman Sachs says:

Industrial output is the only driver of growth at the moment, given the pressure on domestic demand from the government's deficit reduction efforts.

Obviously the only way forward from here is to dig yourself out on the back of exports. The downside factors are of course that nearly all the principal customers - the rest of the EU - are slowing fast, and, of course, the forint can't be reduced in value because of all those Swiss franc mortgages. Plenty of headaches to come, I'm afraid.