The ECB has updated its wage tracker with agreements signed up to August 2025 and extended the forward-looking horizon to June 2026. Early signals suggest negotiated wage growth in the euro area is set to decline and stabilise in the first half of 2026.
Key figures:
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Negotiated wage growth (smoothed headline indicator): 4.6% in 2024, 3.2% in 2025, projected 1.7% in H1 2026.
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Wage tracker excluding one-off payments: 4.1% in 2024, 3.8% in 2025, 2.5% in H1 2026.
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Coverage: Employee share in forward-looking data is currently 29.7% in H1 2026, down from 46.3% in Q4 2025, but expected to rise as new agreements are signed.
Context:
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The decline partly reflects the fading impact of large one-off inflation compensation payments made in 2024 and frontloaded wage increases in some sectors.
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Belgium has now been added retroactively to the dataset from 2013, and the forward horizon has been pushed six months further.
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The ECB cautions that forward-looking wage tracker data are not forecasts, but reflect the wage dynamics embedded in current collective agreements.
Core message: Preliminary data point to lower and more stable wage growth in early 2026, supporting the ECB’s broader projections of moderating compensation growth (3.4% in 2025, 2.7% in 2026).
