Germany

Germany takes the helm of the EU’s rotating presidency on Wednesday with one overriding aim: to rescue the bloc from the worst economic crisis in its history, the Financial Times reported. Chancellor Angela Merkel met French president Emmanuel Macron today to discuss next steps for the €750bn recovery proposals unveiled by the two leaders in May, as well as the EU budget.

Germany’s opposition called on Monday for a parliamentary inquiry into the collapse of payments firm Wirecard after a global fraud that left a gaping hole in its books went undiscovered by auditors and regulators for years, Reuters reported. The request for an inquiry came after Germany said it would cancel its contract with the country’s privately-run accounting watchdog FREP as a result of a scandal that financial regulator BaFin has branded a “total disaster”.

Deutsche Lufthansa AG dodged insolvency. Now Europe’s biggest airline faces the arduous task of transforming itself into a leaner carrier to compete in an air-travel market hamstrung by the coronavirus, Bloomberg News reported. The approval of a 9 billion-euro ($10.1 billion) German bailout concludes weeks of sometimes rancorous negotiations with the government and follows frenzied speculation in recent days over whether billionaire Heinz Hermann Thiele, Lufthansa’s largest shareholder, would scupper the deal. Instead, he backed it.

The German government plans to terminate its contract with the country’s accounting watchdog after payments company Wirecard filed for insolvency last week in one of Germany’s biggest fraud scandals, a government official said on Sunday, Reuters reported. Bild am Sonntag newspaper reported earlier on Sunday that the Justice and Finance Ministries would on Monday cut ties with the Financial Reporting Enforcement Panel (FREP), a quasi-private entity that supervises the financial statements of listed firms.

Wirecard collapsed on Thursday owing creditors almost $4 billion after disclosing a gaping hole in its books that its auditor EY said was the result of a sophisticated global fraud, Reuters reported. The payments company filed for insolvency at a Munich court saying that, with 1.3 billion euros ($1.5 billion) of loans due within a week its survival as a going concern was “not assured”.

Lufthansa has drawn up a plan to avoid insolvency should a shareholder vote on Thursday fail to approve a $10 billion government bailout, a company source told Reuters on Wednesday, Reuters reported. The German government could still get a 20% stake, as originally envisaged. But under the new plan this would happen in two steps, without the need for shareholders’ approval, the source said. Germany’s flagship airline has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and what promises to be a protracted travel slump, and has sought a state rescue to avoid insolvency.

Germany stood by its 9 billion-euro ($10 billion) bailout plan for Deutsche Lufthansa AG, daring the airline’s disgruntled top shareholder to shoot it down at a pivotal vote this week, Bloomberg News reported. With Lufthansa fighting for survival after the coronavirus outbreak punctured a decades-long global travel boom, billionaire Heinz-Hermann Thiele is threatening to block the rescue plan -- which would dilute his 15.5% holding and influence -- at a shareholder meeting scheduled for Thursday.

German payments firm Wirecard AG was tipped into a full-blown crisis after disclosing it was unable to locate 1.9 billion euros ($2.1 billion) missing from its balance sheet, Bloomberg News reported. The company now faces a potential cash crunch and warned lenders could call in loans of as much as 2 billion euros after multiple delays to publication of an audited financial report. The company’s creditors are likely to organize and appoint advisers to try and negotiate a solution that gets as much as their money back as possible. Here’s how that may unfold.

Deutsche Lufthansa AG faces one of the most momentous weeks in a near 70-year history, with a clash between its biggest investor and the German government threatening to scupper a 9 billion-euro ($10 billion) bailout and push Europe’s biggest airline toward collapse, Bloomberg News reported. With Lufthansa fighting for survival after the coronavirus outbreak punctured a decades-long global travel boom, billionaire Heinz-Hermann Thiele is threatening to block the rescue plan, which would dilute his holding and influence, at a virtual shareholder meeting Thursday.

Germany and Deutsche Lufthansa AG are considering cutting back the country’s 9 billion-euro ($10.1 billion) aid package as the airline group closes in on additional commitments from Switzerland, Austria and Belgium, people familiar with the discussion said, Bloomberg News reported. The government is ready to lower the burden for Germany’s taxpayers and is weighing whether to reduce an earmarked 3 billion euros of loans to Lufthansa from the state-run Kreditanstalt fuer Wiederaufbau fund, the people said, asking not to be named discussing a confidential matter.