German economic growth has stalled in the fourth quarter of 2018

Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) said, the gross domestic product (GDP) in the fourth quarter of 2018 remained at the same level as in the previous quarter (0.0%), upon price-, seasonal and calendar-adjustment. Thus there were two different phases of short-term economic development in Germany in 2018. In the first half of 2018, the GDP had increased, by 0.4% in the first quarter and 0.5% in the second quarter. In the third quarter, however, the GDP was down 0.2%. For the whole year of 2018, this was an increase of 1.4% (calendar-adjusted: 1.5%). Hence growth was slightly smaller than reported in January.

The quarter-on-quarter comparison (price-, seasonally and calendar-adjusted) shows that positive contributions to growth came from domestic demand. In the fourth quarter of 2018, gross fixed capital formation, especially in construction (+1.3%) but also in machinery and equipment (+0.7%), increased markedly compared with the third quarter of 2018. Household final consumption expenditure increased slightly (+0.2%), whereas final consumption expenditure of general government grew markedly (+1.6%). However, development of foreign trade did not make a positive contribution to growth in the fourth quarter. According to provisional calculations, exports and imports of goods and services increased by 0.7% each on the previous quarter.

Measured by unadjusted figures, year-on-year economic growth continued to slow. The price-adjusted GDP rose by 0.9% (calendar-adjusted: 0.6%) in the fourth quarter of 2018, following increases of 1.1% (calendar-adjusted: also +1.1%) in the third quarter of 2018, 2.3% (calendar-adjusted: +2.0%) in the second quarter of 2018 and 1.4% in the first quarter of 2018 (calendar-adjusted: +2.1%).