Due to substantial international interdependence, economic activity for specific countries cannot be analyzed without a close look on the development of the world economy. However, indicators that reflect the expected future course of economic activity in real time rarely exist when the world economy as a whole is concerned. This project aims at filling in this gap by developing a world indicator based on the monthly responses to the ZEW Financial Market Test Survey. To assess the utility of such an indicator, this project further evaluates its forecasting ability by econometric techniques.