Berlin (Reuters) – The demand for online trade in Germany is up, announced on Monday the German retail trade federation (HDE), which noted its forecasts for the year despite the gloom of consumers, the trade tensions having prompted Chinese applications to turn away from the United States to focus on Europe.
The HDE now tables an annual growth of 4% of online retail turnover in Germany in 2025, at 92.4 billion euros, against an increase of 3% initially anticipated.
Overall, the turnover of the German retail trade experienced growth of 1.1% in 2024 in real terms and corrected for seasonal effects.
“The online retail trade is again the engine of retail trade growth in Germany after a certain number of low years,” said Stephan Tri, deputy director of the HDE, in a statement.
The HDE said that growth was particularly strong for online purchases of food and pharmaceutical products.
The morale of German consumers has improved somewhat in recent months thanks to the hopes of economic recovery from the new government, but it remains firmly in negative territory, trade tensions and a prolonged recession weighing on households.
German consumers are increasingly attracted to Chinese e-detaineers such as TEMU and Shein, who in turn have concentrated on the European market in the context of American customs duties.
“It is clear that the two companies are moving towards Europe because the American market has become uninteresting for them because of customs policy,” said Stephan Tri.
(Written by Rachel More and Matthias Inverardi, Elena Smirnova, edited by Augustin Turpin)
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