However, it does not enjoy the lingua franca status of English, French or even Spanish. German is a language of immense economic use in the German-speaking countries. The total number of speakers, including non-native speakers such as myself, is said to be 120 millions, but I could not verify this. There are many German speakers in Eastern Europe but the subject is quite sensitive and no Rocket German review statistics are available. Since less than 3% of the Italians speak any German, this Italian was justly proud of his achievement. We spoke in German while all his colleague were looking at him in awe, murmuring Lui parla il tedesco. He immediately chose German, altough I am quite sure he also spoke some of the others.