Germany

Switzerland-based trader Gunvor said on Monday that operations had resumed at its German Ingolstadt refinery, acquired from insolvent refiner Petroplus earlier this year, Reuters reported. Gunvor, which is co-owned by a Russian tycoon and chief executive Torbjorn Tornqvist, bought the 100,000 barrels per day plant in May from the insolvent Petroplus to build on its presence in Europe. "We intend to build upon the good and enduring customer relationships, and enlarge our trading activities in Germany and the Alpine region," said Tornqvist in an emailed statement.

Hanwha Group’s bid to buy the insolvent German manufacturer Q-Cells SE drew a competing approach from a Spanish power-plant builder that also wants to own what was once the biggest solar-cell maker, Bloomberg Businessweek reported. Isofoton SA was approved to bid for Q-Cells after Chief Executive Officer Angel Luis Serrano met with the German company’s insolvency administrator Henning Schorisch today, according to an e-mailed statement from Isofoton. Serrano will present the bid, to be made with a U.S. investor it didn’t identify, to Q-Cells’ creditors at an Aug. 29 meeting, it said.

South Korea's Hanwha Corp intends to buy solar Group Q-Cells, the insolvent German group said in a statement on Sunday, Reuters reported. Hanwha and Q-Cells' insolvency administrator Henning Schorisch had signed a contract, which needs to be approved by a creditors' meeting to be held on Aug. 29. Q-Cells, once the world's largest maker of solar cells, said Hanwha would take on liabilities, which amount to "the low hundreds of millions." In addition it would pay a "medium double-digit million-euro range" in cash," Q-cells said in the statement.

Germany's Hahn airport needs government funding to avoid insolvency, a shareholder representative was quoted as saying on Wednesday, as falling passenger numbers exacerbate losses, Reuters reported. Jochen Riebel, a former local secretary of state who represents minority shareholder Hesse on the airport's board, said Hahn would use up all its cash within about six months without more finance.

Troubled German shipbuilder P+S Werften, which operates two of the country's biggest shipyards, has asked some of its customers to pay for ships in advance to bridge a liquidity shortfall and avert insolvency, Reuters reported. New Chief Executive Ruediger Fuchs has approached Danish shipper DFDS, passenger ferry operator Scandlines and Greenland's Royal Arctic Line, a P+S spokesman said on Wednesday. P+S had planned to file for insolvency on Wednesday, the spokesman said, the possibility of receiving funds from customers gave Fuchs a couple more days to come up with a rescue plan.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel faces one of the toughest choices of her career in the coming weeks: whether to risk the unraveling of the euro zone—or her government, The Wall Street Journal reported. After a summer lull, Greece is again Ms. Merkel's biggest headache. The Greek government, struggling with depression-like conditions that have pushed the economy to the brink, is likely to need many billions of euros of additional aid to avoid bankruptcy.

The German government stuck to its insistence yesterday that Greece must comply with the reform and austerity conditions agreed in its €130 billion rescue package, but Berlin did not flatly reject any extension of the debt-repayment terms it faces, the Irish Times reported. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, will meet Antonis Samaras, the Greek prime minister, for bilateral talks in Berlin next week, at which “everything can be put on the table”, according to Steffen Seibert, the chancellor’s spokesman.

A new challenge to the European Stability Mechanism, the eurozone’s permanent €500bn rescue fund, has been filed in the German constitutional court, seeking to delay ratification by Germany until it has sought the opinion of the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, the Financial Times reported.

Suggestions of a split in German policy over the way ahead in tackling the crisis in the eurozone, between the government in Berlin and the Bundesbank in Frankfurt, are exaggerated, according to officials in the German capital, the Financial Times reported. But battle lines are opening between the leading political parties in the country over the need for the largest economy in the eurozone to play a more generous role in supporting its debt-laden partners, as the main contenders seek to break a stalemate in the polls 13 months ahead of next year’s general election.

Italy needs moral support from Germany but not its cash, Prime Minister Mario Monti said in an interview published on Sunday as German conservatives renewed calls for Greece to leave the euro zone, Reuters reported. The Italian leader also told weekly magazine Der Spiegel that he was concerned about growing anti-euro, anti-German and anti-European Union sentiment in the parliament in Rome.