Et sounds like good news that Volker Treier, head of foreign trade at the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK), has to announce on Wednesday. At least the mood among German companies abroad has brightened. Optimists and pessimists are roughly balanced in the company survey:
28 percent expect the economy to improve in the next twelve months, 27 percent expect it to deteriorate. “The proportion of optimists has increased by eleven percentage points compared to the previous survey and the proportion of pessimists has decreased by twenty percentage points,” says Treier. “Overall, however, expectations remain very subdued. There is no sign of a real boom for miles.”
But the message behind the numbers is even worse for the German economy.