Insolvent German drugstore chain Schlecker aims to find an investor by the end of May, its administrator told a German magazine, Reuters reported. "If everything goes according to plan, we can be done with the investor process by the Pentecost holiday," Arndt Geiwitz told weekly Wirtschafts Woche, according to an excerpt of an article to be published on Monday. Unlisted Schlecker, which competes with privately held peers Rossmann and dm, filed for insolvency in January after struggling to secure funds against a gloomy economic backdrop.

Europe's low interest rates are fueling rising house prices in Germany, presenting the region's policy makers with a fresh challenge in their fight to restore its economic health, The Wall Street Journal reported. Signs of a property-price boom in parts of Germany are becoming a headache for the European Central Bank, which has for the past two years struggled to fashion a single stance on interest rates and support for banks that fits countries as disparate as depressed Greece and mighty Germany.

Insolvent German drugstore chain Schlecker will close around 2,000 stores and lay off almost half its workforce, the price for failing to keep up with rivals in a rapidly changing consumer market, Reuters reported. "It is very harsh that Schlecker's employees, some of whom have been with the company for a long time, are losing their jobs, and it is a decision that we did not take lightly," insolvency administrator Arndt Geiwitz said on Wednesday.

German reluctance to bolster EU debt rescue funds has delayed talks on the issue despite calls from the G20 for Europe to make progress on the issue, a eurozone governmental source said Tuesday, Agence France-Presse reported. "Germany is not ready," the source told AFP in reference to the latest developments in a global tug-of-war over eurozone emergency bailout funding.

Chancellor Angela Merkel won a parliamentary vote on Greek aid after warning German lawmakers that pushing Greece out of the euro would risk “incalculable” damage, defying a public backlash against more bailout funds, Bloomberg reported. In a vote that showed dissent in her coalition growing, 496 members of the lower house, or Bundestag, voted in favor of the 130 billion-euro ($174 billion) package in Berlin; 90 voted against and five abstained.

The German government is set to resist or delay increasing the size of the eurozone’s financial “firewall” against contagion from the Greek debt crisis, in the face of mounting pressure from its partners, the International Monetary Fund and the US administration, the Financial Times reported. Steffen Seibert, spokesman for Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, insisted on Wednesday that Berlin saw no need to increase the size of the permanent €500bn European Stability Mechanism. “The German government’s position has not changed,” he said.

The administrator of insolvent German chipmaker Qimonda is requesting 1.7 billion euros ($2.23 billion) from its former parent Infineon, claiming Qimonda paid Infineon for a business in 2006 that was negative in value, Reuters reported. In 2006, Qimonda gave new shares to Infineon in return for Infineon's memory business, a deal that is now being probed in an ongoing lawsuit brought by the administrator, Infineon said on Tuesday.

Deutsche Bank AG is closing in on an agreement to pay about €800 million ($1 billion) to settle decade-old claims that a former chief executive officer helped drive German media company Kirch Group into bankruptcy, according to people familiar with the negotiations, The Wall Street Journal reported. The proposed settlement, which would be one of the largest in European history, has been agreed to in principle but had yet to be approved by Deutsche Bank's board as of late Monday, the people said.

The owners of German cable company Primacom have been forced to inject another 20 million euros ($26 million) into the business and restructure its 300 million euros of debt for the second time in a year, Reuters reported. Primacom was taken over in January 2011 by bank lenders including ING Groep and fund managers such as Alcentra Group, Tennenbaum Capital and Avenue Capital following the insolvency of its parent, Primacom AG, in June 2010. This debt for equity swap was achieved through a court procedure at the High Court in London.

German chancellor Angela Merkel told Greece today to make up its mind fast on accepting the painful terms for a new EU-IMF bailout, but the country's political leaders responded by delaying their decision for yet another day, the Irish Times reported. Failure to strike a deal to secure the €130 billion rescue - much of which Germany will fund - risks pushing Athens into a chaotic debt default which could threaten its future in the euro zone.