Germany

Hank Paulson, the U.S. Treasury Secretary has decided that the German Covered Bond is a solution to many of the woes of the U.S. housing market meltdown. He is backed by four large U.S. banks: Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase…

The FT reports: Citigroup is close to agreeing a sale of its German retail banking operations to Credit Mutuel for between €3bn and €5bn, after the French bank outbid Deutsche Bank in a close race, according to bankers close to the…

The FT reports:The eurozone economy has shown fresh signs of spluttering, with German industrial production dropping unexpectedly sharply in May - the strongest monthly fall since August 1997.-FT, 7 Jul 2008This is the latest sign in a…

Recession worries at the heart of Europe deepened as it was revealed that factory orders in Germany declined unexpectedly for the sixth straight month. With inflation and interest rates rising, it seems rather unlikely that Germany can…

The wage-price spiral is now underway in core Europe as German wages are on the rise. The ECB will surely act as it has no other choice with inflation now the dominant economic concern across the Eurozone.Today, German daily Der Spiegel…

Handelsblatt is reporting that, for the first time in the company's history, revenues are down at Aldi, the formidable grocery chain that chased Wal-Mart out of Germany. That's pretty amazing.The company that made its founders, Karl and…

The word on the street is that Lloyd's TSB, one of the major British banks not hit hard by the mortgage crisis, may be considering a bid for Germany's Dresdner Bank, now owned by the insurance company Allianz. If this sale does in fact…

For my German-speaking readers, I have found an excellent country-by-country look at inflation and its effect and outcome in the Financial Times Deutschland. Specific countries covered are the Euro-Zone as a whole, Germany, Belgium the UK,…

European banks are still in need of time or money to recapitalise their weak balance sheets. This has to be especially worrying for UK banks as they have raised a significant amount of capital and their housing market has yet to see the…

Bloomberg News reported that German retail sales for April were disappointing for the second month in a row. Retail sales growth is negative in Germany, adjusted for inflation.The reason: inflation. Consumers in Germany are losing…