Germany - Business Confidence





Germany: Business Confidence

Mnemonic CIB.IDEU
Unit Index 2015=100, SA
Adjustments Seasonally Adjusted
Monthly 0.35 %
Data Feb 2024 85.5
Jan 2024 85.2

Series Information

Source Ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich
Release Ifo Business Climate Index for Germany
Frequency Monthly
Start Date 1/31/2005
End Date 2/29/2024

Germany: Business

Reference Last Previous Units Frequency
Business Confidence Feb 2024 85.5 85.2 Index 2015=100, SA Monthly
Industrial Production Jan 2024 94.7 93.7 Vol. Index 2021=100, CDASA Monthly
Capacity Utilization 2023 Q4 81.9 82.9 %, SA Quarterly
Change in Inventories 2023 Q4 27.59 4.85 Bil. EUR, CDASA Quarterly
Real Change in Inventories 2023 Q4 27.59 4.85 Bil. EUR, CDASA Quarterly

Release Information

The Ifo Business Climate Index is a highly-regarded early indicator of economic developments in Germany published on a monthly basis. Detailed results of the Ifo Business Survey are published in the ifo Konjunkturperspektiven (in German) and a summary (in German) is available online. The Ifo Business Climate is a much considered indicator for the economic evolution in Germany. It is again and again the subject of scientific analyses in which the different qualities of the business climate are examined.

The Ifo Business Climate is a widely observed early indicator for economic development in Germany. It is based on ca. 7,000 monthly survey responses of firms in manufacturing, construction, wholesaling and retailing.

The firms are asked to give their assessments of the current business situation and their expectationsfor the next six months. They can characterise their situation as "good", "satisfactorily" or "poor" and their business expectations for the next six months as "more favourable", "unchanged" or "more unfavourable". The replies are weighted according to the importance of the industry and aggregated. The balance value of the current business situation is the difference of the percentages of the responses "good" and "poor", the balance value of the expectations is the difference of the percentages of the responses "more favourable" and "more unfavourable". The business climate is a mean of the balances of the business situation and the expectations.

The Ifo Business Climate balances can fluctuate between extreme values of -100 (i.e., all responding firms appraise their situation as poor or expect business to become worse) and +100 (i.e., all responding firms assessed their situation as good or expect an improvement in their business). For calculating the index values of the business climate and its components - situation and expectation - the balances are all increased by 200 and normalized to the average of a base year (currently 2005).

Seasonal adjustment procedures are methods of eliminating annually recurring patterns in time series. The seasonal adjustment is a fundamental component of the calculation of the results series of the Ifo Business Survey. As of January 2015, the Ifo Institute is adopting the internationally widespread X-13ARIMA-SEATS procedure developed by the U.S. Census Bureau. This will bring Ifo’s seasonal adjustment procedure into line with international standards.

Data is subject to revisions.

For more information, please visit: http://www.cesifo-group.de/ifoHome/facts/Survey-Results/Business-Climate.html