Despite the rolling Omicron wave, stock market professionals are again surprisingly optimistic about the economy in Germany.

The barometer for the assessment of the next six months rose unexpectedly in January by 21.8 to 51.7 points and thus to the highest level since July 2021, as the Mannheim Center for European Economic Research (ZEW) on Tuesday in its monthly survey 178 analysts and investors announced.

Economists had only expected a small increase to 32.0 points.

"The economic outlook has improved considerably since the beginning of the new year," commented ZEW President Achim Wambach.

"The phase of economic weakness in the fourth quarter of 2021 should soon be over." However, the situation was rated worse than recently and than expected.

Most of the experts surveyed by ZEW assumed that economic growth would improve in the next six months, explained Wambach.

Because the corona incidences are likely to weaken significantly by early summer.

Chief economist Thomas Gitzel from VP Bank spoke of a clear upturn signal and is counting on the spring: "The supply chain difficulties for many products will not then be resolved, but they will at least improve."

"Omicron economical short and painless"

In 2021 as a whole, the German economy grew by 2.7 percent.

But between October and December, according to initial estimates by the Federal Statistical Office, the economy slowed by between 0.5 and 1.0 percent compared to the summer quarter.

For 2022, most experts expect more growth than in the previous year, but the Corona variant Omikron should still be a burden for companies and consumers at the beginning of the year.

Jörg Angele from the asset manager Bantleon still expects stagnation in the current quarter, but then growth of around two percent in spring and summer.

"The probability of a very dynamic economic development from the spring is very high." The experts surveyed by ZEW also realized that "from an economic point of view, the omicron wave should be short and relatively painless".

In addition, Angele sees signs that the massive material bottlenecks in the industry are gradually ebbing away.

Pent-up demand is waiting to be satisfied

The tourism industry is also hoping for improvement. According to initial estimates, the hospitality industry alone made nominal two percent more sales in 2021 than in the first year of Corona. However, adjusted for rising prices, revenues stagnated according to the Federal Statistical Office. "This means that the years 2020 and 2021 were the weakest in terms of sales since the start of the time series in 1994." Compared to the pre-crisis year 2019, the hospitality industry turned over almost 36 and in real terms even a good 40 percent less.

Analyst Marc Decker from Quintet Private Bank explained that many people not only postponed their consumption but also their travel wishes during the pandemic.

This pent-up demand should boost business for hotels, tour operators and airlines in the coming months.

"Against this backdrop, there is reason to be optimistic that at least the second half of 2022 could be positive for the tourism sector."