BERLIN, Sept. 28 (Xinhua) -- Rising prices and the prospect of arduous negotiations preceding the establishment of a new federal government will weigh on German consumer sentiment, according to a study published on Thursday by the GfK market research institute.
The Nuremberg-based organization predicted that its closely-watched consumer sentiment barometer would fall by 0.1 points to 10.8.
GfK expert Rolf Buerkl identified a decline in income expectations as the key driver behind the development and noted that these were likely related to rising inflation.
German inflation was recently measured at 1.8 percent, below the European Central Bank's official goal of just under two percent but above the current Eurozone average.
Buerkl also expected the difficult negotiations to form a new governing coalition to have a negative impact on consumer spending.
GfK surveyed around 2,000 Germans at the height of the recently-concluded election campaign between September 1 and 15. After recording gains for five months in a row, the barometer for income expectations fell by 8.7 points to 52.7 as the responses of those polled indicated growing pessimism over their future earnings.
By contrast, expectations for economic growth improved by 3 points to 33.4 points. The GfK further noted that Germans' current propensity to consume remained at a "very high level". The corresponding indicator fell slightly by 1.1 points to 50.7 points.
Consumers in Germany hence remained in a "spending mood" according to Buerkl. Only few people had to worry about losing their job due to historically low unemployment rates.
Buerkl said that this lead to "more planning security, especially with regards to large expenditures which may require taking on credit".
