Gas down, energy imports fall

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Fifth consecutive monthly drop. Let’s start from here, from our purchases from abroad, because it is precisely from the side of imports that it is possible to understand the level of “fever” that our economy still suffers from the side of prices. January, in the Istat data, brings some good news from this point of view, summarized by the fifth slowdown for the seasonally adjusted import data.

The fall in gas prices, visible in the daily quotations in Amsterdam, in fact continues to translate into concrete savings for our economy. The cyclical drop in import prices (-3.5%) is in fact – observes Istat – the largest since 2005, since the start of these historical series. The drop in energy (-17.8%) was decisive, because net of this, the economic downturn would be minimal (-0.1%). Situation undergoing improvement but still not resolved, because looking at the annual comparison, compared to January 2022, if energy is almost unchanged (-0.1), the average prices of imports are 4.6% higher, the result of an upward drag that can only be disposed of in the space of a few months. In December alone, however, the growth was 11.3%.

Translated into billions, the monthly outlay for energy in January amounted to 9.6 billion, 400 million more than in the same month of the previous year but above all 1.8 billion less than in December, a decrease of 16% which becomes much larger if one thinks of the most dramatic moments of last summer, when monthly disbursements were close to 15 billion.

On the sales side, however, the double-digit trend that has been consolidated for some time (15th consecutive month) continues, with an increase of 15.3% for Made in Italy exports mainly from outside the EU (+20.5%) and China , with Beijing clearly rebounding (+137%) as a result of an anomalous comparison with a month (January 2022) of almost lockdown.

Among the sectors, growth is widespread, with the sole exception of means of transport (not cars, which grow by 22%) and the star of the moment continues to be pharmaceuticals, which grew by more than 50% also due to extraordinary productions launched for the Covid emergency.