Economic expectations are also improving slightly.

In the forecast for January, the consumer climate rose to minus 25.1 points—an improvement of 2.5 points compared to the previous month’s minus 27.6 points (revised).

The results of the GfK Consumer Climate survey for December this year is published jointly by GfK and its founder, the Nuremberg Institute for Market Decisions (NIM).

A slightly higher consumer sentiment was last measured in August this year (minus 24.6 points).

"It remains to be seen whether the current increase represents the start of a sustained recovery in consumer sentiment," explained Rolf Burkl, consumer expert at NIM.

“Consumers still have major worries. Geopolitical crises and wars, sharply rising food prices and discussions around national budget for 2024 continue to cause uncertainty. As a result, the level of consumer sentiment is currently still very low," he said in a release.

For a lasting upturn in the mood of consuming, it is necessary to address the causes of uncertainty and find a solution here. In concrete terms, this means that further steps must be taken towards price stability and solutions must be found to the various crises, the release noted.

The positive development of the consumer climate this month is primarily based on income expectations. In December, the indicator increased by 9.8 points compared to the previous month, therefore climbing to minus 6.9 points. A better value was last measured in July 2023, at minus 5.1 points.

As the income expectations improve, the willingness to buy is also noticeably increasing. After a stagnation phase of around one and a half years, the indicator gained 6.2 points and now stands at minus 8.8 points. The willingness to buy was last higher in March 2022, at minus 2.1 points.

Despite the significant increase, willingness to buy is currently still below the level during the two lockdowns of the COVID-19 pandemic. This fact confirms the current level of uncertainty among consumers, caused by the multiple crises.

Economic pessimism among consumers continued to decline at the end of the year. The indicator for the economic expectations rose to minus 0.4 points—1.9 points higher than in the previous month. Compared with the corresponding period of the previous year, the increase is just under 10 points.

Despite the slight increase, consumers are still quite cautious about further economic developments in Germany.

The German Economic Institute expects a decline in gross domestic product of 0.5 per cent next year.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)