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By Dave Graham
BERLIN, Feb 9 (Reuters) - German exports fell sharply in December after a record decline the previous month, rounding off probably the worst quarterly performance in the country's recent history which is poised to set the tone for 2009.
Preliminary Federal Statistics Office figures on Monday
showed Germany's trade surplus narrowed by less than expected to
10.7 billion euros ($13.7 billion) in December because exports,
though weak, did not fall as much as had been feared.
As a result, economists calculated that Germany likely remained the world's biggest exporter of goods for a sixth year in succession in 2008, albeit perhaps for the last time.
"The German export sector has been literally drowned by the financial crisis," said Carsten Brzeski, an analyst at ING Financial Markets. However, all was not lost, he added.
"There are some flickers of hope. German companies are less pessimistic than many economists and only expect a slight decline in exports for 2009," said.
Germany has been the world's biggest exporter of goods since 2003, and World Trade Organisation chief Pascal Lamy said in Berlin last week global trade was in a "pretty terrible" state.
A breakdown of the trade figures from Europe's biggest economy showed that exports fell by 3.7 percent month-on-month in adjusted terms, while imports dropped 4.1 percent.
This meant the seasonally adjusted surplus was bigger than the figure of 9.9 billion euros forecast in a Reuters poll last week. In November, the surplus stood at 10.9 billion euros.
RECORD CONTRACTION
Alexander Koch, an economist at UniCredit in Munich, said that in dollar terms, German goods exports were in 2008 still higher than those of its nearest competitor, China.
"Chinese exporters are also suffering from weaker global demand. But the decline in Chinese exports in recent months was (nothing like) as pronounced as in Germany," he said, adding China would probably surpass Germany this year.
Axel Nitschke, a foreign trade expert at Germany's chambers of industry and commerce (DIHK), said the outlook for exports had deteriorated palpably since the end of last year.
"We haven't hit the bottom yet," he told Reuters. "Things will continue to go down at the start of the year.
A breakdown of the trade figures showed that compared with the previous year, exports were down by 7.7 percent. The biggest drop was to European Union countries outside the euro area -- which include the likes of Britain and Poland.
German trade initially held up well during the global slump, but exports have fallen away sharply since the banking crisis intensified with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September.
Germany's biggest bank, Deutsche Bank
A key factor behind the decline in exports has been a sharp fall in demand for manufactured goods.
German industrial orders and output in December posted their biggest annual declines since the country reunified in 1990.
The government has forecast Germany will contract by around 2.25 percent this year, which would be its worst annual performance since World War Two. The economy is already in recession and many analysts expect a deeper downturn.
Economy Minister Michael Glos -- who has been criticised for his handling of the crisis -- said at the weekend he would hand in his resignation on Monday.
Leading indicators for January suggested the manufacturing sector's woes may yet deepen, although the Ifo institute's gauge of German business sentiment unexpectedly improved last month.
A senior government source told Reuters on Friday that the economy probably contracted by at least 1.75 percent and possibly by as much as 2 percent on the quarter in the final three months of last year. That would be a record contraction. (Additional reporting by Rene Wagner and Brian Rohan; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)