German lawmakers on Thursday resoundingly backed the latest European rescue, a package of loans from the euro-zone bailout fund to prop up weakened Spanish banks, handing Chancellor Angela Merkel a victory as doubts about the euro rise in Germany, The Wall Street Journal reported. The vote did little to reassure jittery financial markets about Madrid’s economic recovery or its ability to repair its beleaguered banks.

With millions of euros in debts and an inability to pay back its loans, the operator of Germany's fabled Nürburgring racetrack, home to many of the country's Formula One races, could declare bankruptcy next week. It may be the end of the legendary racecourse, which first opened in 1927, Spiegel Online reported. The Nürburgring is facing bankruptcy because its private operating company, Nürburgring GmbH, is no longer able to pay the interest on a €330 million loan it was provided by the ISB investment and structural bank, which belongs to the state.

German mail order company Neckermann said it will file for insolvency, after its private equity owner refused to stump up the cash for a restructuring, adding to woes in the German retail sector, Reuters reported. The insolvency follows that of drugstore chain Schlecker, and comes as retailers from Metro to Praktiker and Puma grapple with lower consumer spending in Europe as a result of the region's debt crisis.

Germany's parliament is expected to give broad backing on Thursday to a European aid package for ailing Spanish banks, but the government left nothing to chance this week and appealed to citizens and lawmakers in Internet video messages and local media to support the bailout, The Wall Street Journal reported.

A key measure of German investor confidence fell unexpectedly in July in another sign that the eurozone financial crisis is weighing on Europe's largest economy, Bloomberg Businessweek reported on an Associated Press story. The ZEW institute said Tuesday its index fell for the third month in a row to minus 19.6 points from minus 16.9 in June. Market analysts foresaw a small increase to minus 15.0. Germany is the largest economy in the 17-country eurozone and has an outsized impact on the currency union and its efforts to dig out of a crisis over too much government debt.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Sunday she was confident that a majority of German lawmakers would back aid for Spain's ailing banking sector at a special sitting of the lower house Bundestag set for Thursday, Reuters reported. Euro zone finance ministers agreed last Monday on a rescue package of up to 100 billion euros for Spanish banks, which have been crippled by a burst housing bubble.

Shares in Centrotherm plunged on Wednesday after the German solar equipment maker became the latest victim of the industry's ongoing shakeout by filing for protection from creditors, Reuters reported. The industry's crisis, triggered by overcapacity amid falling government subsidies, has hit peers Q-Cells, Solar Millennium, Solarhybrid and Solon, which have all filed for outright insolvency in recent months. "With the help of these proceedings, the company aims to consistently pursue the reorganization path that it has already adopted," Centrotherm said.

Deutsche Annington Immobilien AG, Germany's leading residential property owner, on Tuesday, July 10, unveiled a preliminary agreement to restructure €4.3 billion ($5.27 billion) of debt in a deal that could lead to a public listing in 2013 or 2014, The Deal Pipeline reported. If the deal goes ahead, British buyout firm Terra Firma Capital Partners Ltd., which owns the German business through a dedicated fund, will start the ball rolling with an injection of €504 million, roughly half in cash. Terra Firma will deliver the other half by forgiving a shareholder loan.

Germany's regionally-owned lender Bayerische Landesbank, or BayernLB, has reached a long-awaited agreement with the European Commission on the bank's restructuring, the European Union's antitrust chief said Monday, Dow Jones reported. A formal decision on BayernLB's fate is due July 25, E.U. Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said following a meeting with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble and Horst Seehofer, premier of the state of Bavaria. Almunia added the final deal will reduce the size of the bank, but will give it strength.

About 160 academics published a petition Thursday calling on German citizens to put pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel to block any further moves toward European integration that would make German taxpayers foot the bill for the debts of other euro-zone countries. The petition specifically hits out at Ms. Merkel's concessions to other euro-zone governments at a summit of European leaders last week. In all-night negotiations, Ms.