This growth trend has replaced a five-year stagnation phase. If this stagnation phase is taken into account, mechanical engineering production has grown by 0.9% per year since 2012.

The new Quest economic report uses Bollinger Bands for the first time, a statistical measure of the fluctuation range of variables that is widespread in the financial world. The Bollinger Bands cover 95% of all deviations of the values from the average of the last 12 months. Thus, they make it possible to see at a glance whether the deviations of the current values from the average of the last 12 months have reached a stage that signals an economic boom or a crisis.

The current value of the production index is 4 index points above the one-year average and thus in the middle of the Bollinger Bands. So there are currently no signs of an extreme situation.

In October 2018, the growth trend in sales in mechanical engineering, which began in February 2014, reached a new high of €20.8bn since the outbreak of the global economic crisis in 2008. This growth trend is 3.4% per annum.

The report about production and sales in German machinery industry is available on https://www.quest-trendmagazine.com/en/machinery-industry/production-and-sales/production-and-sales-of-machinery-industry.html

Another report quantifies by means of the Bollinger Bands the increasing fluctuation ranges of production and sales since the world economic crisis. The link to this report is https://www.quest-trendmagazine.com/en/machinery-industry/production-and-sales/production-and-sales-of-machinery-industry-since-2000.html

The Quest Trend Magazine analyses the growth expectations to 2020 of machine-builders, the worldwide export markets of machinery industry, the majority of its automation-relevant sectors and many aspects of its automation technology at the machines.