In February, industrial production showed abnormally high growth rates

According to Rosstat, in leap year February 2024, industrial production showed abnormally high growth rates. In annual terms, the figure increased by 8.5% (the Interfax consensus forecast assumed an increase of 5.6%, the same was the assessment of analysts of the Telegram channel “Hard Figures” without the leap year effect). In January, the figure was almost half as much – 4.6%.

In the mining industry, annual growth in February accelerated to 2.1% from 0.8% in January (in January-February – 1.4%), in processing – to 13.5% from 7.5% (10.6% ). The output of finished metal products (except for machinery and equipment) increased faster than average – by 51.5%; computers, electronics and optics – by 47.2%; other vehicles and equipment (including aircraft and ships) – by 38.6%; vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers – by 37.9%; medicines and medical materials – by 22.8%; furniture – by 20.5%; leather and products made from it – by 21.3%; electrical equipment – by 19.6%.

Alexander Isakov from Bloomberg Economics draws attention to the risks for Russian oil refining associated with attacks on refineries – and the potential connection of its indicators with the output of military sectors aimed at countering such attacks (in monetary terms, their output has already increased almost 2.5 times against levels 2017–2021).

February’s noticeable improvement in industrial dynamics can be explained by significant budget expenditures at the beginning of the year, which significantly increased estimates of demand and output in industry (see Kommersant on March 20). Moreover, Rosstat’s estimates, taking into account seasonality and the calendar, record an abnormal surge in output in February (by 1.5% compared to January) after prolonged stagnation throughout most of last year (see chart). “We don’t see any significant changes. Without mining and “closed” industries, output, taking into account seasonality and calendar, according to our estimates, decreased in February compared to January by 0.3%,” says Vladimir Salnikov from TsMAKP, noting that the effect of a leap year is always difficult to “clean out” from the data, which reduces the accuracy of the estimates. According to Mr. Isakov, the increase in output for February, taking into account seasonality and the calendar, was half as much as Rosstat shows – 0.8%.

Artem Chugunov