37 Foreword | Mission |  Management Report  | Share | Marketing | Consolidated Financial Statements - IFRS - | Report of Supervisory Board | Board of Management It is expected that macroeconomic production in the industrial countries will expand moderately in 2005, albeit not with the same acceleration as before. If monetary conditions and earning perspectives remain advantageous, increased investment  spending is to be expected. Overall, the driving economic  indicators appear to be stable and an economic slump is not in sight, despite the oil price increases and weaker growth stimuli from monetary and fiscal policy. According to the expert opinion issued by the “Kiel Institute for World Economics”, the economic expansion in the USA could lose further momentum due to a tightening of monetary policy and the loss of tax incentives. Japan should be able to compensate for the lower increase in demand from China through stabilizing its domestic economy. Thus, the Japanese economy is expected to grow less than in 2004 but still faster than the medium-term trend. The European Union, too, should see a slackening of  economic expansion in the coming years, but production in the Euro Zone could rise with a small change in tempo. Inflation should remain moderate, and the unemployment rate could fall marginally. Since global economic development can have a marked effect on general consumer behavior, the dampened prognoses for the world economy could also make themselves felt in the sporting goods sector. The current consumer trend in the USA toward expensive, performance-based products could be slowed by less consumer spending due to higher oil prices. Despite the expectations of cautious expansion of the world economy, orders for the first half of 2005 give rise to a positive outlook.  A year without any large sports events and a challenging market environment that has already presented difficulties for retailers cannot realistically be expected to bring a ground-breaking upswing in the sporting goods industry. However, the soccer World Cup in 2006 is likely to begin impacting the market at the end of 2005.  Outlook Cautious Expansion of the World Economy in 2005