And the German economy? Nowhere are the extremes more pronounced than here: Germany overtakes Japan as the third largest economy after the USA and China - extremely astounding! The most important German share index, the DAX, reaches an all-time high - extremely impressive! But this jubilant news does not fully reflect the feelings of worry and anxiety in many German companies: Bayer is crashing; Volkswagen has to make massive savings and energy prices are threatening to explode. Numerous retail groups have slipped into insolvency, most recently René Benko's Signa Holding, the parent company of Galeria Kaufhof. Oh, and let's not talk about the infrastructure in our country, the crumbling highway bridges and Deutsche Bahn, which achieved a punctuality rate of 52 percent in long-distance transport in November - not counting completely canceled trains and five-minute delays are considered punctual. This is all extremely bad.

The extremes make it difficult to answer very simple questions: Are we doing well economically? Is the German economy doing well? Will we be fine? One answer to these questions is provided by the Working Group on Tax Estimates in its 165th tax estimate from October 26: the state will receive €916.1 billion from its citizens; significantly more than the €799.3 billion in the last pre-corona year 2019 and an all-time record. It shows the high performance of Germany's people and companies. Extremely good. However, this income will not be enough for the federal government's planned expenditure. Extremely what-ever!

In any case, I hope that 2024 will be an extremely boring year for all of us. A year in which conflicts are resolved in the spirit of international law and peace and terrorist organizations and extremists disappear. A year in which we can concentrate on working on our companies, advancing and completing projects.

And for now, I wish you an extremely interesting read of materialfluss, relaxation and a successful start to the new year!

Yours
Daniel Schilling