"Today's flash PMI [Purchasing Managers' Index for manufacturing and services] results showed that private sector output growth in Germany slowed further in December. The pace of expansion was in fact the weakest in one-and-a-half years and well below levels seen earlier in the year, when GDP grew 0.8%," the author of the study Oliver Kolodseike said in comments to the report.
Kolodseike suggested that the reduction of oil prices and energy costs gave German private companies a chance to lower prices, but do not help the firms attract new customers.
Overall German company performance has also been affected by the recent train operator and airline pilot strikes in Germany in late October and November of this year.
On Wednesday, German small-and-medium-sized business owners learned they may want to slow down their investments and sell some holdings if a new estate tax ruling before the constitutional court of Germany is approved, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.
If the new ruling is adopted, owners in Germany's private sector will not be able to transfer their businesses from one generation to the next without paying an estate tax.
Most of German firms are family run and account for more than 50 percent of the country's work force, according to Munich-based Family Business Foundation.
