Hello, I'm Paige and this is the Euro Intelligence podcast covering current affairs in the EU and Euro area.

I am joined by Wolfgang and Susanna, directors of Eurointelligence in Oxford.

Guys, the big story this week, of course, is Germany's regional elections.

Wolfgang, who came out on top and what's your take?

Well, the CDO definitely came out on top.

That's no question. The bigger

issue is what to make of it. It's a 17-point lead. This is astonishing. Some of the polls

have suggested that the AFD might actually overtake the CDU. Even the latest polls on the weekend

before the election suggested they were neck and neck and they were 17 points apart.

It's not really that the AFD has been weak.

There's still over 20%.

They're the biggest opposition party

after these elections.

They scored a little worse than last time,

about three percentage point less,

but that's, you know,

the last election was within the

refugee crisis. So that that was not a necessarily good comparison. But, you know, I would say

that it's a bit of expectations management. So if you obviously say to people, oh, yeah, we think

that, you know, they were going to win and then they don't win't win. People are disappointed, but 20% is still a big number.

So it's definitely not a sign that Germany is turning against the AFD.

You can't say that.

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