Tender timing
When to award road contracts, measured as average deviation from each market's own annual mean in index points. The aggregate's award month is not the markets' award month: award timing is a market question, not a market-wide one.
Road — 5 markets
February, not January
- January is the trough in Spain and in the Europe aggregate. Germany (-5.5 pts), France (-2.8 pts), Italy (-2.3 pts) and Poland (-1.1 pts) all trough in February. A buyer who reads the aggregate and awards in January is a month early in 4 of 5 markets.
- Timing pays most in Germany — 9.8 points trough to peak — and least in Poland at 2.8 points, where the month you sign is worth less than the terms you sign.
- Practical rule: a pan-European award window of mid-January to mid-February captures every market trough at once, without needing a separate calendar per country.
- The Europe aggregate troughs in January at -3.3 points. That is the composite's answer, not any market's answer. A composite cannot tell you when to award in a single market.
Optimal award month by road market
Markets only. The Europe aggregate is deliberately excluded from this chart and given its own panel below, because reading it alongside the markets invites treating it as one of them.
Seasonal shape, all 5 road markets
- Germanyobserved
- Spainobserved
- Franceobserved
- Italyobserved
- Polandobserved
One value axis in index points. Colour is bound to the market, so hiding one never repaints the others; the table twin carries every value.
Europe aggregate — an aggregate, not a market
Held apart on purpose. This is a weighted composite of markets that trough in different months, so its own trough is an artefact of the weighting rather than a month any buyer can act on.
How to read the road markets
Germany — award in February at -5.5 points below the mean; worst is June at 4.4. Spread 9.8 points.
Spain — award in January at -4.6 points below the mean; worst is December at 2.8. Spread 7.4 points.
France — award in February at -2.8 points below the mean; worst is November at 2.0. Spread 4.7 points.
Italy — award in February at -2.3 points below the mean; worst is July at 2.0. Spread 4.4 points.
Poland — award in February at -1.1 points below the mean; worst is December at 1.7. Spread 2.8 points. Narrow enough that timing barely pays in this market.
Deviation from each calendar year own mean, averaged over 2022-2025. Computed from held monthly transaction data and cross-checked against a direct system query, agreeing within 0.04 points on five of six markets and on every trough month. Spain January magnitude differs (-4.60 held vs -5.61 quoted); the held value is carried.