Dutch Economic Tracker Remains Negative, With 8 of 13 Indicators Below Trend

The Dutch economic picture remained in negative territory in October, with 8 of 13 indicators in Statistics Netherlands’ Business Cycle Tracer running below their long-term trend. The overall reading was almost unchanged from September, showing an economy that is still expanding in some areas but has not moved back into a broadly above-trend pattern.

The October Tracer reading stood at minus 0.17, compared with minus 0.16 in September, according to Statistics Netherlands, known as CBS. That small move matters less than the broader message. More than half of the monitored indicators remain on the weak side of trend, which is why CBS described the October picture as almost equally negative.

In its latest economic update, CBS paired that headline assessment with a set of mixed underlying data. Manufacturing output posted a strong gain, exports, household consumption and investment were all higher from a year earlier, and gross domestic product grew in the third quarter. At the same time, confidence data softened, bankruptcies increased, unemployment remained higher than earlier in the year and the broad composite tracker stayed below zero.

That mix makes the release more nuanced than a simple recession signal or growth signal. The Tracer is designed to provide a macroeconomic snapshot from the stream of data CBS has published during the past month or quarter. It is not a prediction model, and CBS notes that the picture can differ across households, companies and regions.

October reading shows the Dutch economy still below its longer-run pace

The Business Cycle Tracer is built around 13 indicators that cover production, spending, trade, labor-market conditions, housing and confidence. When CBS says an indicator is below trend, it means the measure is performing worse than its long-term average path. In October, eight indicators fell on that weaker side of the ledger, leaving only five above trend.

The October composite of minus 0.17 was only slightly more negative than September’s minus 0.16, so the month-to-month change was modest. Even so, the direction of travel remains important. The Netherlands has not returned to the positive readings seen earlier in the cycle, and the latest figure suggests the economy is still operating in an environment of uneven momentum rather than broad-based acceleration.

Consumer sentiment was one part of that softer picture. CBS said consumers were slightly more negative in October than in September. Producer confidence also deteriorated from the prior month, although it remained above the average of the past 20 years. Consumer confidence, by contrast, stayed below its long-run average, highlighting the continued gap between household caution and the relative resilience still visible in some business indicators.

Labor-market figures were also mixed rather than clearly strong. The unemployment rate stood at 4.0% in September, unchanged from August, but the number of unemployed people rose to 408,000. CBS said unemployment has increased by an average of 5,000 per month over the previous three months. Job vacancies were broadly flat at the end of the third quarter, while total hours worked edged up 0.3% from the second quarter.

Housing data pointed to cooling price momentum rather than outright decline. Existing owner-occupied home prices in September were 2.9% higher than a year earlier, slower than the 3.3% annual increase recorded in August. On a month-to-month basis, prices were down 0.4% from August, and CBS said the annual pace of increase has been slowing almost continuously since late 2024.

Strong manufacturing and GDP growth temper the negative headline

The negative October reading does not mean every major part of the Dutch economy weakened. One reason the CBS release reads as balanced rather than alarmist is that several hard-data measures strengthened noticeably. The clearest example was manufacturing output. Calendar-adjusted industrial production in August was 12.0% higher than a year earlier, the biggest increase in more than four years. Output also rose 3.3% from July on a seasonally adjusted basis.

Trade and domestic demand figures also improved. The total volume of goods exports in August increased 4.9% from a year earlier after adjustment for working days, with machinery and transport equipment contributing to the rise. Dutch households spent 2.1% more on goods and services in August than they did a year earlier after adjustment for prices and shopping-day effects. Investment in tangible fixed assets was up 1.8% from a year earlier, helped by machinery, computers and buildings.

CBS also pointed to stronger quarterly output. According to its first estimate, Dutch gross domestic product grew 0.6% in the third quarter from the second quarter. The statistics agency said the increase was driven mainly by the trade balance and higher inventory changes. That is a meaningful detail for readers because it shows the October Tracer did not turn negative due to an outright contraction in the most recent GDP quarter.

At the same time, the release contained reminders that the economy is not improving evenly. Bankruptcy numbers moved higher in September, with 16 more bankruptcies than in August after adjustment for court-session days, a 5% increase. Confidence indicators worsened in October. Those softer measures help explain why the headline business-cycle assessment did not improve despite the stronger output and spending data.

For markets and policy watchers, the practical takeaway is that the Dutch economy appears to be in a late-stage patch of uneven expansion. Some current-activity indicators are firm, but the broad trend gauge remains negative. That combination can persist for a while, especially when survey-based confidence and labor-market slack fail to improve in step with production and GDP.

CBS is ending the monthly Tracer update after October

The October publication carries another important development that goes beyond the monthly reading itself. CBS said this is its final monthly economic review based on the Business Cycle Tracer. Starting in November, the Conjunctuurklok, or Business Cycle Tracer, will no longer be updated.

The agency also said it will discontinue the monthly news releases on household consumption, investments in tangible fixed assets and goods exports. The visualizations for consumption, export and investment conditions will also stop being updated. Quarterly statistics for those indicators will continue as part of the country’s economic growth estimates.

That change means October’s minus 0.17 reading is not just the latest monthly snapshot. It is also the last regular monthly Tracer reading in the current format. For readers who follow European economic indicators closely, that matters because it removes one established, high-frequency summary tool for the Dutch economy and shifts more attention to quarterly output data and individual monthly releases that remain available.

CBS did not present the discontinuation as a change in the state of the economy itself. Still, it is a notable reporting change for analysts, economists and investors who have used the Tracer as a quick gauge of whether the Dutch economy was running above or below its longer-term trend. October’s final message from that tool is straightforward: the economy was still in a mildly negative macroeconomic position, and the underlying data remained too mixed to call a decisive turn.