In the year 2025, the global economy expanded by 3.0%, slightly faster than in the previous year, with all regions recording positive growth rates. The rate of growth was fueled by strong expansion in the Asian markets, which offset weaker European and North American growth.
The EMLA region once again expanded more slowly than the global economy. Stubborn service inflation and weak investment activity due to a high degree of uncertainty dampened the development in this region.
Growth in the NA region was slower than global expansion in the year 2025. A significant factor weighing on growth was the extended government shutdown and its consequences in the United States in the fourth quarter of 2025, which pulled annualized growth downward toward the end of the year. In addition, above all low-income households were under pressure from price increases, which led to considerably weaker consumption despite a robust labor market.
Economic growth in the APAC region outpaced global economic growth. The rapid expansion was driven thanks to government subsidies, primarily by India and China; the latter successfully cushioned the persistent real estate crisis by massively subsidizing high-tech-industry and exports.
| Economic environment1 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Growth 2024 | Growth 2025 | |
| % | % | |
| World | 2.8 | 3.0 |
| Europe, Middle East, Latin America2, Africa (EMLA) | 1.7 | 2.0 |
| of which Europe | 1.4 | 1.6 |
| of which Germany | –0.5 | 0.3 |
| of which Middle East | 2.0 | 3.1 |
| of which Latin America2 | 2.0 | 2.6 |
| of which Africa | 3.4 | 4.1 |
| North America3 (NA) | 2.7 | 2.1 |
| of which United States | 2.8 | 2.2 |
| Asia-Pacific (APAC) | 4.0 | 4.4 |
| of which China | 5.0 | 5.0 |
1 Real growth of gross domestic product; source: Oxford Economics, as of January 2026.
2 Latin America (excluding Mexico).
3 North America (Canada, Mexico, United States).
The robust global economic growth performance in the year 2025 is not reflected in all of Covestro’s main customer industries.
At 3.3%, the global automotive industry grew significantly better in fiscal 2025 than in the previous year. This development was primarily driven by strong expansion in China and India, which offset declines in production in North America and Europe and turned the overall result into significant growth.
In the year 2025, the growth rate in the global construction industry was 0.2% and therefore better than in the previous year. Government infrastructure programs and the rapid recovery in Asia and the Middle East more than offset the continuing weakness in private residential construction and the decline in the North American market.
In the year 2025, the growth rate achieved in the electrical, electronics, and household appliances industry was 1.3% and therefore lower than in the previous year. The slowdown in growth in the year 2025 was to a significant extent due to inflation-related consumer reticence in the key markets of the United States and China, as well as the postponement of replacement investments into the year 2026.
The negative growth of the global furniture industry worsened to 0.8% in the year 2025 compared with the previous year. The combination of a global real estate crisis, structurally high prices and simultaneous cuts in consumption in favor of services, as well as escalating uncertainty in international trade policy significantly dampened demand in the key markets of North America, Europe, and China.
| Main customer industries1 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Growth 2024 | Growth 2025 | |
| % | % | |
| Automotive | –0.6 | 3.3 |
| Construction | –2.4 | 0.2 |
| Electrical, electronics and household appliances | 3.7 | 1.3 |
| Furniture | –0.5 | –0.8 |
1 Covestro’s estimate, based on the following sources: GlobalData Plc, B+L, CSIL (Centre for Industrial Studies), Oxford Economics. We limited the economic data of our “automotive and transportation” and “furniture and wood processing” main customer industries to the automotive and furniture segments (excluding the transportation or wood processing segments). As of: January 2026.