Producer confidence; sentiment indicator manufacturing industry, branches

Producer confidence; sentiment indicator manufacturing industry, branches

Sector/branches (SIC 2008) Margins Seasonal adjustment Periods Producer confidence (%) Producer confidence indicator components Expected activity (%) Producer confidence indicator components Opinion on order books (%) Producer confidence indicator components Stocks of finished products (%)
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 March -3.3 8.8 -16.3 -2.5
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 April -4.0 5.3 -18.2 0.8
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 May -2.6 7.1 -13.9 -1.1
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 June -0.7 14.2 -17.2 0.9
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 July -5.4 3.7 -20.3 0.3
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 August -6.4 -2.3 -17.4 0.4
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 September -6.5 -4.7 -14.6 -0.2
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 October 2.3 8.7 1.1 -3.0
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 November 1.2 11.2 -6.6 -0.9
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2025 December 2.0 13.0 -4.1 -2.9
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2026 January* 0.0 18.7 -15.5 -3.1
29-30 Transport equipment Value Seasonally adjusted data 2026 February* -1.3 10.8 -10.5 -4.2
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 March -7.2 2.5 -23.4 -5.4
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 April -10.1 -2.3 -29.8 -3.9
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 May -6.1 0.4 -20.0 -4.2
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 June -4.6 7.3 -23.7 -3.8
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 July -9.7 -3.9 -27.7 -3.2
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 August -10.3 -8.8 -24.5 -4.1
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 September -11.0 -12.1 -21.7 -3.7
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 October -4.0 -1.5 -7.7 -6.7
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 November -4.7 1.8 -15.6 -5.0
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 December -3.7 6.3 -13.1 -9.8
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2026 January* -5.5 12.0 -24.9 -8.4
29-30 Transport equipment Lower bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2026 February* -5.6 3.2 -18.5 -8.9
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 March 0.6 15.1 -9.2 0.4
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 April 2.1 12.9 -6.6 5.5
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 May 0.9 13.8 -7.8 2.0
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 June 3.2 21.1 -10.7 5.6
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 July -1.1 11.3 -12.9 3.8
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 August -2.5 4.2 -10.3 4.9
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 September -2.0 2.7 -7.5 3.3
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 October 8.6 18.9 9.9 0.7
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 November 7.1 20.6 2.4 3.2
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2025 December 7.7 19.7 4.9 4.0
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2026 January* 5.5 25.4 -6.1 2.2
29-30 Transport equipment Upper bound 95% confidence interval Seasonally adjusted data 2026 February* 3.0 18.4 -2.5 0.5
Source: CBS.
Explanation of symbols

Table explanation


Producer confidence is a sentiment indicator for the manufacturing industry that indicates the direction in which manufacturing production is expected to develop. The indicator is an unweighted arithmetic average of three component indicators from the Business sentiment survey of the manufacturing industry. Before the Producer confidence is calculated, seasonal effects are removed from the three component indicators. The questions concern the expected activity in the next three months, opinion on order books and opinion on stocks of finished products. Results of the latter question are inverted when calculating the producer confidence, since a surplus of finished products is seen as something negative.

The more optimistic or pessimistic manufacturing companies are, the more positive or negative the value of the producer confidence indicator is compared with the zero line, and the greater the expectation that manufacturing production in the coming months will increase or decrease respectively. The producer confidence indicator has been available since 1985. For the sectors of manufacturing industry given in this table, the results are available from the start of 1994.
This publication is created using co-financing by the European Commission.

Data available from: January 1985

Status of the figures:
The results are provisional during the reporting year. The results will be declared final in the first month following the reporting year.

Changes compared to the previous version:
Data for a new period has been added.
Seasonally adjusted results for all periods before January 2026 have been re-adjusted. This is in line with the new method, where the results are only finalized after seasonal adjustment has been performed based on results over a full number of years.

Changes as of September 4th 2025:
Corrections have been made to previously supplied data for the manufacture of metals. For this reason figures for producer confidence indicator component ‘Stocks of finished products’ has been adjusted for 24-25 Man. of basic metals and -products and C Manufacturing.

When will new figures be published?
The results for the next month are expected to be published on March 30, 2026.

Description topics

Producer confidence
Producer confidence is a sentiment indicator for the manufacturing industry that indicates the direction in which manufacturing production is expected to develop. The indicator is an unweighted arithmetic average of three component indicators from the Business sentiment survey of the manufacturing industry. Before the Producer confidence is calculated, seasonal and bias effects are removed from the three component indicators. The questions concern the expected activity in the next three months, opinion on order books and opinion on stocks of finished products.

The more optimistic or pessimistic manufacturing companies are, the more positive or negative the value of the producer confidence indicator is compared with the zero line, and the greater the expectation that manufacturing production in the coming months will increase or decrease respectively. The producer confidence indicator has been available since 1985. For the sectors of manufacturing industry given in this table, the results are available from the start of 1994.
Producer confidence indicator components
Producer confidence consists of three component indicators from the
Business sentiment survey: expected activity, opinions on order books
and stocks of finished products.
Expected activity
Volume indicator calculated as the percentage of positive answers minus
the percentage of negative answers to the question whether production
in the coming three months will increase, remain the same or decrease.
Seasonal and bias effects are removed.
Opinion on order books
Volume indicator calculated as a percentage of positive answers minus
the percentage of negative answers to the question whether the volume
of orders in the order book are too large, normal or too small,
given the time of the year. Seasonal and bias effects are removed.
Stocks of finished products
Volume indicator calculated as the percentage of positive answers minus
the percentage of negative answers to the question whether the volume
of stocks of finished products is too large, normal or too small, given
expected sales developments. Seasonal and bias effects are removed.
The outcome then is inverted, since a surplus of finished products is seen as something negative.