Germany’s major listed companies cut more jobs worldwide last year than their counterparts in France, Spain and Italy, according to a study. The 40 companies listed on Germany’s DAX index reduced their global workforce by more than 46,000 positions in 2025, from 3.86 million to 3.81 million employees, according to an analysis published Friday by consultancy EY-Parthenon. Compared with the previous year, this represents a decline of 1.2 percent.
By comparison, the number of employees at companies listed on France’s CAC index fell by just 0.2 percent to around five million. In Italy and Spain, the study recorded an increase of 0.9 percent in both countries, bringing employment at companies listed on the FTSE MIB and Ibex indices to nearly two million and 1.334 million respectively. The DAX, CAC and FTSE MIB each comprise the 40 leading listed companies in their respective markets, while the Ibex consists of 35 companies.
According to the study, German companies reduced their workforce abroad by 1.3 percent. At their domestic locations, they reduced their workforce by an average of 1.0 percent. In France, the decline at home was even sharper at 1.4 percent, while Spanish companies increased domestic employment by 1.8 percent.
The analysis also showed that job cuts were particularly concentrated among large companies, according to EY-Parthenon. This effect was especially pronounced in Germany. Among the smaller DAX companies, a clear majority of 69 percent increased their number of employees, with worldwide employment in this group rising by 3.5 percent. The picture was reversed among large corporations with more than 100,000 employees: 69 percent reduced their workforces, resulting in an overall decline of 1.1 percent.
“The employment development among Europe’s top corporations is not facing an abrupt downturn, but the direction is clear: large companies in particular are consolidating, and Germany is particularly affected by this,” said EY-Parthenon expert Constantin Gall.
The fact that DAX companies recorded the sharpest decline in employment among the countries examined is “a serious signal” for Germany as a business location, he said. “The combination of weak economic conditions, high costs, excessive regulation, international competitive pressure and the need for structural transformation is increasingly reflected in the employment figures of Germany’s flagship companies.”
Germany has many industrial corporations that, according to Gall, built up an enormous global presence over the past decades while establishing extensive administrative functions in their home market and simultaneously maintaining large-scale production in Germany. According to the study, 37 percent of the employees of DAX companies worldwide work in Germany.
However, this business model, managing global operations from Germany, maintaining research and development activities at home and exporting extensively from Germany at the same time, has come under significant pressure in recent years, Gall explained. “German corporations benefited greatly for a long time from free trade, open markets, low energy costs and a rules-based global economic order.”
However, high profits also led to “inefficient structures, administrative divisions becoming too large and too many layers of management being introduced,” Gall said. “That is now coming back to haunt them: When it comes to speed, innovative strength and cost efficiency, other countries are now often ahead.”
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