Press release No. 039 of 28 January 2022
Gross domestic product (GDP), 4th quarter of 2021
-0.7% on the previous quarter (price-, seasonally- and calendar-adjusted)
+1.4% on the same quarter a year earlier (price-adjusted)
+1.4% on the same quarter a year earlier (price- and calendar-adjusted)
WIESBADEN – The gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 0.7% in the fourth quarter of 2021 on the third quarter of 2021 after adjustment for price, seasonal and calendar variations. After economic performance had increased again in summer despite growing delivery bottlenecks and material shortages, the recovery of the German economy came to a halt at the end of the year due to the fourth Covid-19 wave and another reinforcement of Covid-19 preventive measures. In the fourth quarter of 2021, especially household final consumption expenditure declined on the previous quarter, while government final consumption expenditure recorded an increase. Gross fixed capital formation in construction decreased on the third quarter of 2021. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) also reports that the GDP increased by 2.8% in 2021 as a whole (also calendar-adjusted). The original result (+2.7%) was thus slightly revised.
Gross domestic product still down in a pre-crisis comparison
The GDP in the fourth quarter of 2021 was up by a price-adjusted 1.4% on the fourth quarter of 2020 (also calendar-adjusted). The GDP in the fourth quarter of 2021 was still 1.5% lower (price-, seasonally and calendar-adjusted) than in the fourth quarter of 2019, the quarter before the Covid-19 crisis.
Revision of previous results
In addition to calculating first data for the fourth quarter of 2021, the Federal Statistical Office reviewed the results published earlier and included new statistical information in the calculations for the remaining quarters of 2021. The uncertainties during the Covid-19 crisis may lead to larger revisions than usual. For the price-adjusted GDP, this resulted in changes of up to 0.4 percentage points in the data published so far. Detailed data on the recalculations are shown in the table “Comparison between old and new figures” at the end of this press release.
| Unadjusted figures | Figures according to X13 price-adjusted | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| At current prices | Price-adjusted | Seasonally and calendar-adjusted | Calendar- adjusted | |||||
| EUR billion | % 1 | 2015 = 100 | % 1 | 2015 = 100 | % 2 | % 1 3 | ||
| 1 Change on the previous year or the same quarter of the preceding year in %. 2 Change on the previous year or quarter in %. 3 As for year the calendar-adjusted values equal the seasonally and calendar-adjusted values (except for differences due to rounding). qtr = quarter | ||||||||
| 2020 | 3,367.56 | -3.0 | 102.33 | -4.6 | 102.12 | -4.9 | -4.9 | |
| 2021 | 3,567.08 | 5.9 | 105.19 | 2.8 | 104.94 | 2.8 | 2.8 | |
| 2020 | 1st qtr | 859.81 | 0.8 | 105.17 | -1.5 | 105.54 | -1.8 | -1.9 |
| 2nd qtr | 774.06 | -9.2 | 93.80 | -11.3 | 94.99 | -10.0 | -11.3 | |
| 3rd qtr | 853.38 | -2.7 | 104.20 | -3.6 | 103.58 | 9.0 | -3.7 | |
| 4th qtr | 880.31 | -1.3 | 106.17 | -1.9 | 104.35 | 0.7 | -2.9 | |
| 2021 | 1st qtr | 848.65 | -1.3 | 102.00 | -3.0 | 102.59 | -1.7 | -2.7 |
| 2nd qtr | 866.06 | 11.9 | 103.92 | 10.8 | 104.82 | 2.2 | 10.4 | |
| 3rd qtr | 915.37 | 7.3 | 107.16 | 2.8 | 106.56 | 1.7 | 2.9 | |
| 4th qtr | 937.00 | 6.4 | 107.67 | 1.4 | 105.78 | -0.7 | 1.4 | |
| New result | Previous result | Difference | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Figures adjusted for seasonal and calendar effects using X13 | Unadjusted figures | Figures adjusted for seasonal and calendar effects using X13 | Unadjusted figures | Figures adjusted for seasonal and calendar effects using X13 | Unadjusted figures | ||
1 Seasonally and calendar-adjusted figures: change on the previous year or previous quarter; qtr = quarter | |||||||
| Change, percent 1 | Percentage points | ||||||
| 2021 | 2.8 | 2.8 | 2.7 | 2.7 | 0.1 | 0.1 | |
| 2021 | 1st qtr | -1.7 | -3.0 | -1.9 | -3.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 |
| 2nd qtr | 2.2 | 10.8 | 2.0 | 10.4 | 0.2 | 0.4 | |
| 3rd qtr | 1.7 | 2.8 | 1.7 | 2.5 | 0.0 | 0.3 | |
| 4th qtr | -0.7 | 1.4 | x | x | x | x | |
More information
Detailed results for the third quarter of 2021 will be released by the Federal Statistical Office on 25 November 2021.
A long time series with quarterly results on the gross domestic product starting with the first quarter of 1970 is available here.
The GDP also forms part of the Crisis Monitor(www.destatis.de/krisenmonitor), by means of which the Federal Statistical Office compares the development of major short-term indicators in the Covid-19 crisis and the financial and economic crisis of 2008/2009. The Crisis Monitor complements the Corona statistics webpage (www.destatis.de/corona), which provides statistical information on the economic and social consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. Also, the Dashboard Germany data portal (www.dashboard-deutschland.de) combines up-to-date indicators of official statistics and from other data providers on various topics such as economy and finance as well as environment, health and mobility.
