Official sector data processed by the CONFINDUSTRIA MARMOMACCHINE Studies Center for the first five months of 2025 confirm the slight downturn in Italy’s exports of natural stones already seen in first-quarter figures and partly expected after the records set last year. From January to May Italy’s total sales on foreign markets of marbles, travertines, granites and natural stones in general – both raw and finished products – in fact lessened in worth by 3.8% on an annual basis, amounting to 840.6 million euros.
We remind readers that in 2024 Italy’s stone exports grew by 5.8% from the previous year, reaching a record 2.178.5 million euros (the previous peak was of 2.153 million in 2022), with an average price for Italian stone materials sold abroad that had for the first time surpassed the 1,000 euro/ton mark (1,016.4 to be precise).
A disaggregated analysis of the data shows that the slight downturn seen in the first part of 2025 was due to a decrease in sales of finished and semi-finished materials (-5.1% from January-May 2024), down to 657.5 million or just under 80% of the total worth of the Italian stone industry’s foreign revenue.
The market ranking was again led by the United States, to which manufactures worth 217.1 million were exported (up 5.8% after the excellent +14% in 2024), while there were noticeable losses in sales to Germany (2nd buyer with 48.9 million, -7.4%), France (3rd with 43 million, -16.8%), Switzerland (4th with 36.2 million, -1.4%), the United Arab Emirates (5th with 25.7 million, -5%) and Saudi Arabia (6th with 24.6 million, -38.6%). Completing the top ten were, in order: the United Kingdom (22.2 million, – 13.7%), Austria (16.6 million, -1.4%), Australia (16 million, -3.9%), the Netherlands (14.2 million, +30.2%).
Again referring to the first five months of year, exports of raw stone materials remained on the excellent levels of 2024 (+1.4%), amounting to 183.1 million euros, with China again in first place among buyers of blocks extracted in Italy with 90.2 million in imports (+6.1%) and a nearly 50% share, followed by India with 17.9 million (+4.5%).
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