The Schleckers, once one of Germany's wealthiest families, have lost their multi-billion-euro fortune, they said on Monday, leaving them unable to pump fresh funds into the insolvent Schlecker drugstore chain, Reuters reported. Schlecker, which competes with privately held chains Rossmann and dm, filed for insolvency last week, putting about 30,000 jobs at risk, as struggling European businesses find it increasingly hard to secure funds against a gloomy economic backdrop.

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, is facing growing political pressure at home to demand stricter fiscal discipline from her eurozone partners at an extraordinary European Union summit in Brussels on Monday. She also faces a potential revolt by conservative members of the German parliament over any call for more taxpayers’ money to bail out the ailing Greek economy.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, sharply criticized for her government's prescriptions of austerity as a cure for the euro zone's sovereign-debt crisis, said labor-market reforms and greater European integration also were needed to correct flaws in the makeup of the common currency, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Germany is open to boosting the firepower of the eurozone’s rescue funds to €750bn in exchange for strict budget rules favoured by Berlin in a new fiscal compact for all members of the currency union, the Financial Times reported. Berlin appeared to soften its longstanding resistance to increasing the funds only hours after the International Monetary Fund warned that the eurozone needed more money to build “a larger firewall” to prevent the crisis from spreading to its core economies.

Germany's biggest drugstore chain Schlecker said it is filing for insolvency after failing to secure funds to keep it afloat while it restructures its business, Reuters reported. "Necessary restructuring measures cannot be implemented as quickly as they would need to be, especially as planned bridge financing did not come through," the company said in a statement on Friday. It said its operations would continue and its employees would continue to be paid as part of the insolvency process.

Angela Merkel has given effusive praise for the economic reforms introduced by Italy’s new government of technocrats, marking a clear seal of approval from the German government – in stark contrast to its long-standing doubts about the previous Italian administration, the Financial Times reported. Speaking after her first bilateral summit with Mario Monti, who succeeded Silvio Berlusconi as Italian prime minister in November, the German chancellor lauded the “extraordinarily important and remarkable measures” already taken by his technocratic administration.

Germany's economy contracted in the fourth quarter, putting it at risk of a shallow recession at a time when euro-zone countries struggling with their debts are looking to the bloc's biggest economy to give the region a lift, The Wall Street Journal reported. Germany's stagnation, after two years of strong growth, could fuel further international calls for the country to stimulate growth. Economists said Germany's nearly balanced budget and ability to borrow money at low cost gives it the scope to boost growth that few others in Europe have.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's party will push for a financial transaction tax in Europe even though opponents of the levy include her junior coalition partners, a senior lawmaker from her Christian Democrats (CDU) said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. "It will happen," Michael Meister, the conservatives' deputy leader in parliament, said a day after Merkel acknowledged resistance in her coalition to the "Tobin tax" plan being pushed aggressively by French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Merkel favours such a tax with or without support from all 27 members of the EU.

Germany and France on Monday pressed Greece and its bondholders to agree on a reduction of Athens's debt burden, warning that Greece's bailout loans from the euro zone and the International Monetary Fund are on hold until a deal is reached with private investors, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The insolvency administrator of Manroland said on Wednesday it was homing in on an investor for the German printing machine maker and saw a deal feasible by the end of the month, Reuters reported. "We now have parties seriously interested in all three production sites in Augsburg, Offenbach and Plauen, with whom we are involved in ongoing negotiations," Werner Schneider of law firm Schneider, Geiwitz & Partner said in a statement, without naming any possible buyers. The firm said no orders had been cancelled and production would continue beyond Jan. 31 based on the current backlog.