After an expected drop in second-half activity for the eurozone's third largest economy, orders for Italian industrial goods slowed sharply in July, the national statistics agency said on Sept. 17.
Orders in July compared with a year earlier grew by 0.7% after jumps of 14.7% in June, 26.6% in May and 20.6% in April, ISTAT said.
The slowdown was attributed to a one percent drop in domestic demand compared with a year earlier, while orders from abroad grew by 3.7%, ISTAT said.
Orders in July dropped by 3% from June.
In the transportation sector they fell by 22.4%, while orders for electrical appliances were off by 23%.
The electronics and information technology sector saw orders grow by 7.5% and orders in the metal industry grew by 13.5%.
ISTAT raised its estimate for second-quarter economic growth last week, but the earliest data available for the third quarter confirmed the slowdown that economists expect in the second half of 2010.
Industrial production also slowed in July, growing by 0.1% after solid growth in April, May and June.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2010
