New Zealand Manufacturing Index Slumps In October - BusinessNZ

(RTTNews) - The manufacturing sector in New Zealand continued to contract in October, and at a faster rate, the latest index from BusinessNZ showed on Friday with a Performance of Manufacturing Index score of 42.5.

That's down from the downwardly revised 45.1 in September (originally 45.3) and it moves further beneath the boom-or-bust line of 50 that separates expansion from contraction.

Among the individual components of the survey, production (41.5), employment (43.3), new orders (44.1), finished stocks (45.7) and deliveries (42.9) all were well into contraction territory.

"Today's PMI is not a good look for GDP and employment growth. Our GDP forecasts already include a decline in the manufacturing sector in the second half of 2023. There's a chance that decline is bigger than we think, if the PMI does not bounce in the final months of the year," BNZ Senior Economist Doug Steel said.