European Foundry Industry Sentiment

August 2026: 

European Foundry Industry Sen­ti­ment improves in August 2026 – expect­a­tions strengthen, but major dif­fer­ences between foundry seg­ments remain. 

The European foundry industry recor­ded a fur­ther improve­ment in busi­ness sen­ti­ment in August 2026. The European Foundry Industry Sen­ti­ment Indic­ator (FISI) increased to 97.0 points, up from 96.0 in July, con­tinu­ing the gradual recov­ery seen after the weak­ness earlier this year. Nev­er­the­less, FISI remains below the bench­mark level of 100, under­lin­ing that the recov­ery of the European foundry industry is still incom­plete and highly uneven across indi­vidual cast­ing seg­ments. The August data show a par­tic­u­larly strong con­trast between steel foundries, which con­tinue to face dif­fi­cult cur­rent con­di­tions, and the much stronger non-fer­rous sector.

The FISI is the earli­est avail­able com­pos­ite indic­ator provid­ing inform­a­tion on the per­form­ance of the European foundry industry. It is pub­lished monthly by EFF — European Foundry Fed­er­a­tion and is based on sur­vey responses from the European foundry industry. EFF mem­bers assess both the cur­rent busi­ness situ­ation and their expect­a­tions for the next six months.

European man­u­fac­tur­ing envir­on­ment con­tin­ues to improve

The August FISI res­ults should be viewed against a more encour­aging man­u­fac­tur­ing envir­on­ment. European man­u­fac­tur­ing also strengthened dur­ing August. The final Euro­zone Man­u­fac­tur­ing PMI reached 52.7, up from 51.9 in July and its highest level since May 2022. The improve­ment was sup­por­ted by stronger man­u­fac­tur­ing activ­ity in Ger­many, although con­di­tions remained uneven across indi­vidual European economies.

The Busi­ness Cli­mate Indic­ator (BCI) for the euro area stood at ‑0.22 in August, com­pared with ‑0.19 in July. Although it there­fore remains in neg­at­ive ter­rit­ory, the longer-term chart shows that the busi­ness cli­mate has recovered con­sid­er­ably from the lows recor­ded in 2024. The BCI is pub­lished by the European Com­mis­sion and assesses con­di­tions in euro-area man­u­fac­tur­ing based on pro­duc­tion trends, order books, export order books, stocks and pro­duc­tion expectations.

Taken together, FISI at 97.0, BCI at ‑0.22 and European Man­u­fac­tur­ing PMI at 52.7 present a mixed but gradu­ally improv­ing pic­ture. Man­u­fac­tur­ing activ­ity is expand­ing, while con­fid­ence in the European foundry industry is recov­er­ing more slowly and remains below its bench­mark level.

Iron foundries: cur­rent con­di­tions soften, but expect­a­tions rebound

The situ­ation of European iron foundries remained mixed in August. The assess­ment of the cur­rent busi­ness situ­ation decreased by 0.5 points to 99.5 index points, bring­ing it just below the bench­mark level of 100. At the same time, how­ever, expect­a­tions improved sig­ni­fic­antly. The index meas­ur­ing expect­a­tions for the next six months increased by 2.7 points to 88.0.

This rep­res­ents a not­able change com­pared with July, when the cur­rent-situ­ation indic­ator had improved to 100.0 while six-month expect­a­tions declined to 85.3. The August res­ults there­fore sug­gest that, although cur­rent mar­ket con­di­tions have softened slightly, iron foundries have become more con­fid­ent about the months ahead.

Nev­er­the­less, expect­a­tions remain well below 100. This indic­ates con­tin­ued cau­tion regard­ing future order intake and demand from import­ant cus­tomer indus­tries. Iron foundries remain par­tic­u­larly exposed to devel­op­ments in auto­mot­ive pro­duc­tion, mech­an­ical engin­eer­ing, com­mer­cial vehicles, agri­cul­tural machinery and other indus­trial sectors.

The August increase in expect­a­tions is encour­aging, but a sus­tain­able recov­ery will ulti­mately depend on stronger orders and higher pro­duc­tion volumes across European manufacturing.

Steel foundries: cur­rent situ­ation remains very weak, but expect­a­tions improve

European steel foundries con­tinue to report the most dif­fi­cult cur­rent con­di­tions among the three major foundry seg­ments. In August, the assess­ment of the cur­rent busi­ness situ­ation increased slightly by 0.2 points to 74.5 index points. At the same time, expect­a­tions for the next six months increased by 0.6 points to 98.2. The sub­stan­tial gap between the cur­rent-situ­ation index of 74.5 and expect­a­tions of 98.2 is par­tic­u­larly sig­ni­fic­ant. It shows that steel foundries remain under con­sid­er­able pres­sure today, but com­pan­ies expect con­di­tions to improve over the com­ing six months.The July fig­ures already showed this con­trast, with cur­rent con­di­tions at only 74.3 and expect­a­tions at 97.6. The August improve­ment in both indic­at­ors is there­fore pos­it­ive, although the extremely low cur­rent-situ­ation read­ing con­firms that a mean­ing­ful recov­ery in actual busi­ness activ­ity has yet to materialize.

Steel foundries remain depend­ent on invest­ment-intens­ive sec­tors such as heavy machinery, energy, min­ing, rail, infra­struc­ture and defence. Stronger cap­ital invest­ment and indus­trial orders will there­fore be essen­tial if improved expect­a­tions are to trans­late into higher capa­city util­isa­tion and production.

Non-fer­rous foundries remain the strongest segment

The pic­ture is sub­stan­tially more pos­it­ive for European non-fer­rous foundries. In August 2026, the assess­ment of the cur­rent busi­ness situ­ation increased by 0.4 points to 133.6 index points. Expect­a­tions for the next six months strengthened even more, rising by 1.9 points to 150.9. Both indic­at­ors are not only well above the bench­mark level but also con­sid­er­ably stronger than those recor­ded in the iron and steel cast­ing seg­ments. In July, the cur­rent-situ­ation indic­ator stood at 133.2 and expect­a­tions at 149.0, mean­ing that the sec­tor strengthened fur­ther in August. Non-fer­rous foundries there­fore remain the strongest part of the European foundry industry. The seg­ment con­tin­ues to bene­fit from demand con­nec­ted with light­weight com­pon­ents, elec­tri­fic­a­tion, energy tech­no­lo­gies and advanced indus­trial applications.

The par­tic­u­larly high six-month expect­a­tions read­ing of 150.9 indic­ates strong con­fid­ence com­pared with the fer­rous cast­ing sec­tors and sug­gests that non-fer­rous foundries expect favour­able mar­ket con­di­tions to continue.

Out­look: recov­ery is becom­ing more vis­ible, but remains uneven

The August res­ults provide grounds for cau­tious optim­ism. Over­all FISI increased from 96.0 to 97.0, while global man­u­fac­tur­ing activ­ity remained firmly in expan­sion ter­rit­ory with a PMI of 52.3. Euro­zone man­u­fac­tur­ing strengthened fur­ther, reach­ing a PMI of 52.7. At the same time, the BCI remained neg­at­ive at ‑0.22, demon­strat­ing that the broader European indus­trial envir­on­ment is not yet free of uncertainty.

The dif­fer­ences between indi­vidual foundry seg­ments remain strik­ing. Iron foundries are close to the bench­mark level in their assess­ment of cur­rent con­di­tions, but their expect­a­tions remain sub­dued. Steel foundries con­tinue to exper­i­ence par­tic­u­larly weak cur­rent busi­ness con­di­tions, des­pite sub­stan­tially stronger expect­a­tions for the com­ing six months. Non-fer­rous foundries, by con­trast, report both strong cur­rent con­di­tions and very pos­it­ive expectations.

For European foundries, the key ques­tion is now whether improv­ing man­u­fac­tur­ing activ­ity and stronger expect­a­tions will trans­late into higher order intake, increased capa­city util­isa­tion and stronger invest­ment by cus­tomer industries.

The industry con­tin­ues to face sig­ni­fic­ant struc­tural chal­lenges, includ­ing high energy and pro­duc­tion costs, geo­pol­it­ical uncer­tainty, global com­pet­i­tion and uneven demand from key cus­tomer sec­tors. EFF has also high­lighted com­pet­it­ive­ness issues related to the EU’s Car­bon Bor­der Adjust­ment Mech­an­ism (CBAM), par­tic­u­larly the risk that European foundries face higher costs for impor­ted raw mater­i­als while many impor­ted fin­ished foundry products remain out­side the mech­an­is­m’s scope.

European foundries are stra­tegic sup­pli­ers to the auto­mot­ive, machinery, energy, rail­way, aerospace, defence, con­struc­tion and infra­struc­ture sec­tors. Main­tain­ing a com­pet­it­ive European foundry industry is there­fore essen­tial not only for foundry com­pan­ies them­selves, but also for resi­li­ent European indus­trial sup­ply chains and Europe’s long-term indus­trial competitiveness.

EFF – European Foundry Fed­er­a­tion will con­tinue to mon­itor devel­op­ments through its monthly European Foundry Industry Sen­ti­ment Indic­ator (FISI), provid­ing mar­ket intel­li­gence on cur­rent con­di­tions and expect­a­tions across the European foundry industry.

Table – FISI and BCI in 2026:

The FISI – European Foundry Industry Sen­ti­ment Indic­ator – is the earli­est avail­able com­pos­ite indic­ator provid­ing inform­a­tion on the European foundry industry per­form­ance. It is pub­lished by EFF —  European Foundry Fed­er­a­tion every month and is based on sur­vey responses of the European foundry industry. The EFF mem­bers are asked to give their assess­ment of the cur­rent busi­ness situ­ation in the foundry sec­tor and their expect­a­tions for the next six months.

The BCI – Busi­ness Cli­mate Indic­ator – is an indic­ator pub­lished by the European Com­mis­sion. The BCI eval­u­ates devel­op­ment con­di­tions of the man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tor in the euro area every month and uses five bal­ances of opin­ion from industry sur­vey: pro­duc­tion trends, order books, export order books, stocks and pro­duc­tion expectations.

Pur­chas­ing Man­agers’ Index (PMI) -  in the Euro area is an indic­ator of the eco­nomic health of the man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tor. It is based on such indic­at­ors as: new orders, invent­ory levels, pro­duc­tion, sup­plier deliv­er­ies and the employ­ment environment.

EFF Con­tact:

Wit­old Dobosz
Gen­eral Sec­ret­ariat
mail: info@eff-eu.org