German inflation eased more than expected in November, falling to its lowest level since June 2021 due to a decline in energy prices, data from the federal statistics office showed on Wednesday, Reuters reported. The inflation rate fell to 2.3% in November. German consumer prices, harmonised to compare with other European Union countries, had risen by 3.0% year-on-year in October. A 4.5% year-on-year drop in energy prices had a particularly dampening effect on inflation in November, the statistics office said, a so-called base effect due to the very high cost of energy in November 2022.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz urged lawmakers on Tuesday to override Germany’s borrowing limits for a fourth consecutive year, allowing his government to take on billions of euros in fresh debt to modernize his country’s economy despite a budget crisis triggered by a constitutional court ruling, the New York Times reported. “It would be a grave, unforgivable mistake to neglect the modernization of our country in the face of all these acute challenges,” Mr. Scholz told Parliament, citing persistently high energy prices and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.

The German government has imposed a freeze on most new spending commitments in what officials on Tuesday said was a necessary step as Chancellor Olaf Scholz's coalition grapples with a deepening budget crisis, Reuters reported. The government's spending plans were thrown into disarray by a court ruling last week that blocked the government from transferring 60 billion euros ($65 billion) in unused funds from the pandemic towards green initiatives and could starve some German industry of support to keep it competitive in a weak economy.

Transferring back money from Germany's Climate Transformation fund after a top court ruling causes a chain reaction, as the now-cancelled 60-billion-euro in funds leverage far more capital, Economy Minister Robert Habeck said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. "These funds are not an add-on that one can carelessly do without ... the loss to the economy if investments were not made now would be even greater," Habeck told a news conference in the city of Jena. The government was now preparing and discussing at high speed how to set up its budget in light of the ruling and the missing funds.

The German government pledged Monday to invest 4 billion euros ($4.37 billion) in African green energy projects until 2030, with Chancellor Olaf Scholz saying that countries in Africa should benefit more from their wealth of raw materials, the Associated Press reported. Scholz discussed the pledge at a news conference on the G20 Compact with Africa summit taking place in Berlin. He did not mention any specific projects but said the materials used in green energy should be processed in the African nations they come from. “This creates jobs and prosperity in these countries,” Scholz said.

German Economy Minister Robert Habeck on Monday criticised sticking to what he called the country's "inflexible" debt brake and took a swipe at Finance Minister Christian Lindner on prospective subsidy cuts, saying it was "all just talk," Reuters reported. The comments laid bare strains in Chancellor Olaf Scholz's ruling coalition after a court ruling last week that wiped 60 billion euros ($65 billion) from the federal budget sent the government scrambling for alternative sources of funding.

Germany’s top court struck down a key element of the government’s plans to address climate change and transform the economy, dealing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition a major setback that throws its budget policy into disarray, Bloomberg News reported. The Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the shifting of €60 billion ($65.2 billion) earmarked to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic into an off-budget fund violated German constitutional law.

Germany’s highest court ruled on Wednesday that the government’s plan to repurpose tens of billions of euros from a pandemic fund to help finance environmental projects violated the nation’s Constitution, the New York Times reported. The decision threatens to rip a hole in the country’s budget and complicate its transition to a greener economy.

Germany is seeing a growing number of businesses and individuals apply for insolvency as well as declaring bankruptcy according to its Federal Statistics Office (Destatis), which published preliminary details from an annual report on Tuesday, DW.com reported. According to the office's data, insolvency applications rose 22.4% in October 2023 as compared to October 2022. That number had been 19.5% in September. Statisticians said they have consistently registered double-digit increases since June.