Destatis warns: 2.9 percent inflation driven by energy prices

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Since the fuel discount expired on 30 June, freight companies and tradespeople are once again paying the full tax rate on diesel and petrol. The Federal Statistical Office puts inflation for August at 2.9 percent, with energy 10.5 percent higher than a year ago. Businesses with a price clause tied to the overall index receive almost no compensation for this increase.

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What is core inflation? Destatis calculates the rate of inflation excluding food and energy. In August 2026, this figure stands at a preliminary 2.4 percent, below the overall rate. It shows the price pressure outside the two volatile categories.

The fuel discount is gone, but petrol stays expensive

On 30 June, the fuel discount ended – the measure with which the federal government had subsidised petrol since spring. For a freight company, that meant: from 1 July, it filled up at the full tax rate. At the pump, it felt every cent of it. Ruth Brand, President of the Federal Statistical Office, explicitly attributed the price rise in July to energy prices, which had increased above average – fuels in particular.

On 31 August, her office published the rapid estimate for August: inflation of 2.9 percent year on year, 0.1 points more than in July. In June, the rate had still stood at 2.3 percent, suggesting a cooling. That cooling is over now that the discount has ended.

Update from 10 September 2026: Destatis has published the final August figures and confirmed the 2.9 percent. Energy is 10.5 percent above last year’s level, fuels 27.7 percent. So if you have a price escalation clause tied to the overall index, you calculate with 2.9 percent.

One Number, Two Directions

The headline rate is an average across a basket whose prices are currently moving in opposite directions. Energy jumped 10.5 percent in August, while food prices stayed essentially flat. The remaining categories fall somewhere in between.

The flash estimate does not yet break energy down into fuels and household energy. The July figures do. They reveal the gap between motor fuels and household energy: the end of the fuel discount hit only the fuels. Electricity, gas, and district heating were all below their year-earlier levels in July. Because fuels carry more weight than electricity in the statistical energy basket, the category still rises despite cheaper power.

For a business running a delivery fleet and a production hall, these are two very different calculations. The fleet pays for the July spike; the electricity bill does not. In the profit and loss statement, the two items sit in separate lines – in everyday language, they are lumped together as energy. A flat energy surcharge spread across all products therefore distributes a fuel bill onto costs that never actually rose.

Petroleum products cost producers a third more

One step ahead of the consumer sits the producer price index, which Destatis released on 20 August for July. Commercial products cost three percent more than a year ago, while petroleum products came in just under a third higher. Electricity, too, remained below last year’s level at this stage.

Time separates the producer price from the consumer price. A haulage firm feels diesel at the next fill-up receipt. A metal processor buying copper only notices the surcharge when the next supply contract is renegotiated or an existing one runs out. The consumer index captures the same rise later and across the entire basket of goods. Eurostat reported the same pattern for the euro area on 1 September: a rate of 3.3 percent, driven by energy.

What the contract makes of the figure

Many supply and lease agreements among mid-sized companies contain a price escalation clause tied to the consumer price index. It kicks in as soon as Destatis publishes the final monthly figure – depending on the contract, once a year or once an agreed threshold is crossed. If the contract only cites the headline rate, the adjustment follows the roughly three percent. The 23-percent fuel spike across the fleet stays invisible within it. If the contract references an energy index without tracking fuels separately, it averages diesel together with the falling electricity price.

Conversely, a blanket energy surcharge hits customers whose goods contain no fuel at all. Food stood at 0.1 percent in August. A grocer handed a general surcharge sees no justification for it in the statistics and negotiates accordingly. A surcharge calculated per trip, route or pallet, by contrast, matches the July fuel figures.

On 10 September, Destatis will publish the final August figure. That is the day it becomes clear whether the adjustment triggers – and by how much. Whom it affects depends on the index reference in each contract: the headline rate, the energy basket, or a fuel index. Whether the August breakdown shows the same picture as July – dearer fuel, cheaper electricity – is something controlling and procurement teams will only know then.

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Image source: AI-generated (September 2026)

Translated from the German original with AI support. The German version is authoritative.