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Piedmontese companies: difficult start to 2025, production slows but employment holds

According to the latest economic survey by the Centro Studi dell'Unione Industriali Torino, the data reflect the national and European economic scenario. President Gay: "We reiterate the urgency of a European 'mobility act'"

Piedmontese companies: difficult start to 2025, production slows but employment holds

Employment and investment stable, but production slowing. The economic survey carried out in December by the Study Center of the Industrial Union of Turin among the companies of the Piedmontese Confindustria system shows how, in the expectations of the companies of the region, the year has not started in the best way. The data that emerge from the study reflect the complexity of the scenario national and European economic situation, with a climate of confidence that remains in a contraction phase and in line with the trend of previous quarters. 

Piedmontese companies: caution prevails in the first quarter of 2025

Conditioned by the general framework of uncertainty, companies in the region face the 2025 quarter with extreme caution, while showing signs of reaction and the will to "look beyond the difficulties", the study attests. This is demonstrated by the investment management, which are included in the plans of almost three quarters of the interviewees, among whom 23,6% predict thepurchase of new equipment. Similarly, the utilization rate of facilities and resources stands at 77% of full capacity, in line with the previous quarter. 

"We are living in a period of great uncertainty and complexity, but in this context I want to underline how the heterogeneity of our productive fabric - in which a tertiary sector in positive trend stands out - together with the concrete propensity of our entire industry to innovate and compete in the world, continue to represent the added value of the economy of the territory. Proof of this is the stability of investments which, also thanks to industrial policy tools, outline the orientation towards the development of skills and the productive renewal of Turin's companies", he said Marco Gay, president of the Turin Industrial Union, stressing that "the system therefore shows the ability to react, despite the difficulties that important sectors such as metalworking are experiencing throughout Europe". 

Piedmontese companies: more production, orders, profitability and exports

According to the study, by early 2025, expectations show the prospect of reductions in production (optimists/pessimists balance at -4,6%), in orders (-6%) and in the profitability (-8,2%), things like expectations on the scaled down appear exports (-9%).

They remain on the contrary positive expectations on employment levels, albeit reduced compared to the previous quarter, with 12,8% of the sample predicting an increase and 10,4% expecting a decrease in employment, for a confidence index of +2,4%.

“Expectations are inevitably conditioned by a continental economic scenario made even more delicate by the problems of the automotive sector. A sector for whose relaunch we reiterate the urgency of a European 'mobility act', oriented towards the principle of technological neutrality and capable, by stimulating investments in technology and innovation, of giving centrality back to the entire mobility supply chain, of which our territory cannot but be a protagonist", said Gay. 

Big Businesses More Positive

The report also shows how, big companies express more positive expectations compared to the others: among companies with less than 50 employees, the confidence index on production is at -6,2%, while among those with 50 or more employees it stands at -0,8%. In general, the number of companies fearing a growth of energy costs, raw materials and logistics, with payment terms remaining stable and a decrease in the number of companies with a medium-long term order book, in favor of visibility of less than three months. 

The sector trend

Different trend from sector to sector. In fact, if on the one hand in the manufacturing sector symptoms of suffering are detected (balance between optimists/pessimists at -12,7%), on the other hand the tertiary the growth started by the pandemic onwards continues (balance at +13,7%), also thanks to a low incidence of exports which better protects the services market from international tensions.

Looking at the individual sectors, in industry there are forecasts of a widespread decline in production trends, especially for companies metalworking: the balance between those who expect a reduction in volumes in the quarter and those who expect a stable or growing trend is -21,8%, which becomes -27,1% for the realities ofautomotive and a -19,8% for those of the mechatronicsSimilar scenarios in the sectors Wood (-18,8%), textile-clothing (-11,6%), rubber-plastic (-4,7%), chemistry (-4,0%), various manufacturing including jewelry, toys etc. (-11,2%), paper – graphic (-3,7%). Neutral confidence index for food (traditionally counter-cyclical and recovering from the peak in demand at the end of the year) and for the building and plant engineering sector.

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