….it’s again the 11 3/4-ish hour of the month and, to cite the famous Jeremy: „if you know, you know“. So, yes, we all know, what will happen, but – if only for chronological purposes – we still have to cover the month of May 2026. So, without further adue, let’s go into the details.
Rather unsurprisingly, the (not so wise) „economic wise (wo-)men“ slashed the growth forecast for the German GDP simply in half….. (here, read again my own cf. my forecast from January, here).
The German DAX price index (for an explanation, why I prefer this index, cf. here) started at 8,872 points on 4th May and then zig-zagged it’s way to it’s monthly high with 9,284 points on 25th May before receding to 9,191 points on 29th May.
German industrial orders – after cratering by -11.1% (YoY, but still +3.7% MoM) in January before recovering a bit with +0.9% (MoM, even 3.5% YoY) in February and gaining a considerable +5% (MoM, even 6.3% YoY) in March, lost -3.8% (MoM, still 1.6% YoY) in April 2026.
Germany’s industrial production seems – at last – to move a bit: after decreasing by -0.5% (MoM, -1.2% YoY) in January and another -0.3% (MoM, 0.0% YoY) in February, production saw a further decline of -0.7% (MoM, even -2.8% YoY) in March, before now gaining a minor 0.4% (MoM, still -0.5% YoY) in April 2026.
Also, German exports, after losing -2.3% (YoY, but +0.6% MoM) in January , gaining a considerable 3.6% (MoM, still 2.9% YoY) in February, another 0.5% (MoM, even 1.9% YoY) in March, now increased by another 0.9% (MoM, even +3.6% YoY9 in April 2026.
For other German KPI’s, I refer you, first, to the usual (but now „refurbished“ (cf. here) „Destatis Deutschland-Dashboard“ (here) and the „Data Commons (Germany)“ (here), but also to the new IWH Forecasting Dashboard and the DATEV Mittelstandsindex.
The German Target 2 balance gained rather an insignificant 6bn in May 2026 and ended at Euro 1,065bn. The German inflation-rate continued to feel the spillover effects from the Gulf-War: starting from its peak of 10.4% in October 2022, the rate decreased to finally 1.6% in September 2024, re-increased to 2.6% in December 2024. After 2.1% in January , 1.9% in February, the rate increased to 2.7% in March, to 2.9% in April, stabilising at 2.6% in May 2026 (each YoY).
The German Labor market is not really enjoying the usual „spring boom“: Unemployment, after increasing to 6.6% in January, decreasing to 6,5% in February and 6.4% in March, remaining at 6.4% in April, unemployment fell to 6.3% in May 2026 (all MoM), thereby adding another 31,000 to the statistic on a YoY-basis, which means that in two months we saw more than 100,000 unemployed added to the statistics. German CORPORATE insolvency filings – rather unsurprisingly – after increasing by 4.9% in January and a „decrease“ by 0.7% in February (for further details read the post of last month) increased by an incredible 15.8% in March 2026 (all YoY, cf. my most recent comment, here, in German).
The leading German sentiment indicators were not in sync in May: The German (Industrial) Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) lost some 0.6 poins to 51.4 points in May 2026. Also, the ZEW Indicator for business expectations lost another 4.1 points to -77.8 points in May 2026. Against that, the ifo Business Climate Index gained 0.4 points and decreased to 84.9 points in May 2026. The GfK-consumer index decreased further to -33.1 points in May 2026.
To sum up: Although production and exports gaied a bit, the overall picture at the peak of the usual „spring boom“ is rather sobbering. Also, the near future (i.e. June) does not really hold a sign of hope, also the future beyond looks rather dismal: Not only did the investments into Germany fall to a 17-year low, as I reported last month (again here), at the same time there are record-outflows of money from Germany (here). If energy supply (cf. here for an overview) does not get reliable and cheaper very soon (cf. for the risks here and here), thereby strengthen the competitiveness of the German economy these outflows will probably accelerate. This in turn will further weaken the German economy.