k-flash audio commentEU economic development
k-flash audio commentEU economic development

The case

The European Union is often perceived as an economic underperformer, especially when compared with the United States. It seems that this perception is particularly widespread in Switzerland.

Source: Economiesuisse, Rudolf Minsch, 16 February 2026 (heavily abridged and reformulated).

The commentary

This perception is somewhat misleading; the weak performance primarily reflects the sluggish development of our immediate neighboring economies rather than the EU as a whole.

Over the past three years, real economic output has increased by only about 4.5 % in France and roughly 3.5 % in Italy, while Germany has even recorded a cumulative decline of around 1 %. As approximately one quarter of Swiss exports go to these three countries, their weak growth has inevitably weighed on Swiss foreign trade.

At the same time, other parts of the EU tell a very different story. Several peripheral economies have expanded far more dynamically, and the real GDP has grown by about 6 % in Poland, nearly 9 % in Portugal, more than 10 % in Denmark and over 11 % in Spain during the same period.

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