Toys could get even more expensive before Christmas

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Toys in department stores: Prices could rise

Photo: Arnulf Hettrich / imago images/Arnulf Hettrich

There are signs of a certain normalization in the development of prices.

The price expectations surveyed by the Munich Ifo Institute, which shows whether companies want to raise prices, fell by 4.6 points in November to the lowest value of the year.

At 46.7, however, the value is still high.

This means that the proportion of companies that want to raise prices is 46.7 percentage points higher than the proportion of companies that want to lower them.

In the years before the corona crisis, it was mostly around or below 20 points.

In some sectors, price expectations fell particularly sharply:

• In

  gastronomy

  , for example, the value fell from 80.5

  to 58.2

  ,

• in

  bicycle retail

  from 81.9 to

  64.5

• and

  textile manufacturers

  from 50.3 to

  36.0

  .

• And the

  paper

  industry is now

  even showing a negative value of

  minus 10.7 – so price reductions are

  planned here more often than price increases

  .

However, the decline does not apply to all areas, some want to increase their prices:

• The figure for

  toy retailers is 94.4 percent

  .

  So Christmas gifts for children could be more expensive.

• Also in

  food retail (95.1)

  ,

• stationery trade (96.1)

• and at

  drugstores (92.4)

  price increases are often planned.

The price increases for electricity and gas, which are often pending at the turn of the year, are likely to play a role for retailers in particular, said Ifo expert Timo Wollmershäuser.

It is not yet possible for consumers to foresee when inflation will noticeably decrease.

In the area of ​​primary products in particular, however, one can see that the values ​​have fallen.

Most recently, the Federal Statistical Office reported a record decline in so-called producer prices in October.

The development raised hopes that high inflation may have peaked.

ptz/dpa