Germany

Germany's Strauss Innovation, a chain of small department stores, on Friday said it had found a new owner after having sought court protection from creditors earlier this year to rescue its business, Reuters reported. A creditor committee approved a sale of the company to German investor Muehleck Family Office (MFO), which will provide capital for investment and further growth, Strauss said in a statement. Muehleck will own 100 percent of Strauss and plans considerable investments to modernise the stores, said Jens Bender, an adviser and spokesman for MFO told Reuters.

An important reading on the health of the eurozone economy is expected to show this week that growth stagnated in the most recent quarter as German output faltered, confirming the assessment of many analysts that a lasting recovery remains out of reach for the region, the International New York Times reported. Economists are expecting that in the 18-nation currency bloc, gross domestic product expanded 0.1 percent in the second quarter compared with the first quarter, equivalent to an annual rate of growth of 0.4 percent.

Economic growth is likely to remain weak in Germany over coming months, according to leading indicators released today by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Paris-based research body's gauge of future economic activity suggests growth in most developed economies will remain around current rates, with large developing economies making a smaller contribution to global economic growth than they did in the years following the onset of the financial crisis of 2008.

Insolvent project developer Solarstrom has sold the last three projects in its German portfolio with a total capacity of 5MW, PV-Tech.com reported today. The company also confirmed that it is in talks with investors from Asia, Europe and North America about its long-term future. The collapse of equipment suppliers and delays to project sales created a cashflow problem that forced the company into insolvency. With impending project sales in Italy, the firm is optimistic that it will meet its obligations and secure an investor.

Germany’s borrowing costs have fallen to their lowest level on record as Europe’s weak economic recovery persuades the region’s central bank to keep interest rates vanishingly low, the Financial Times reported. The yield on Germany’s 10-year Bunds dropped 2.6 basis points to 1.12 per cent on Tuesday morning. Aside from distortions during the years of hyperinflation in the 1920s, this is Germany’s lowest borrowing rate since the early 1800s. Across Europe, low interest rates have pushed government bond yields down to historic levels.

Germany’s Zweibrücken Airport has announced insolvency, but will continue operations because agreements have been reached with airlines, clients and suppliers, according to several media reports, Air Transport World reported. Insolvency administrator Jan Markus Plathner has been quoted by several German media outlets as saying the collapse of the airport had been avoided, but the search for a potential investor is urgent. Talks with possible investors have already begun. Earlier this year, Germany’s regional Lübeck Airport filed for insolvency.

A group of euro-skeptics that has opposed Germany’s participation in the currency said on Monday that it had filed a lawsuit to block a plan at the heart of efforts to prevent banking crises in Europe, the International New York Times reported. But the suit at the country’s Constitutional Court was given even less chance of success than previous attempts, which created a stir last year by challenging policies intended to prevent disintegration of the eurozone.

Europe’s banking union is set to face a challenge in Germany’s constitutional court, a development that threatens to generate renewed uncertainty over one of the main responses to the eurozone’s financial crisis, the Financial Times reported. Five German academics have filed a case claiming that the EU’s banking union is illegal under German law because it was created without the necessary treaty changes.

Highlighting the risk of investing in startups, goodz GmbH, a Berlin based company that did an equity crowdfunding round this past Spring, has filed for bankruptcy, Crowdfund Insider reported. goodz was an “e-boutique”, launched in February 2014, that featured cutting edge products in a curated e-commerce platform that was determined to target only responsible and well made products. The company was founded by Jeffrey van Ede, the former VP of Sony Europe and CEO of Sony Germany. The crowdfunding campaign on Seedmatch raised €100,000 from 134 investors.

The Bundesbank has backed the push by Germany’s trade unions for inflation-busting wage settlements, in a remarkable shift in stance from a central bank famed for its tough approach to keeping prices in check, the Financial Times reported. Jens Ulbrich, the Bundesbank’s chief economist, told Spiegel, a German weekly, that recently agreed pay rises of more than 3 per cent were welcome, despite being above the European Central Bank’s inflation target of below but close to 2 per cent.