Germany’s factory orders were up 0.2% in February, a monthly increase that fell short of experts’ forecasts. A Reuters poll of analysts had estimated an increase of 0.8%, whilst Bloomberg had predicted a jump of 0.7%. According to Germany’s official statistics agency, this marginal uptick was driven by increased demand in the machinery and equipment sector (+10.7% on the previous month), and more orders within the chemical (+3.1%) and pharmaceutical (+6.6%) industries. Experts slash economic growth forecast for ‘ailing’ Germany February’s growth figure comes after a dramatic monthly fall of -1…