Car Industry’s Diesel Woes Just Won’t Die

Date: 24-07-2017
Source: The Wall Street Journal

Allegations of collusion on emissions technology give investors another reason to avoid the automotive sector

This was supposed to be the year Volkswagen drew a line under its diesel-emissions scandal. Instead the scandal seems to be spreading to the other German car giants.

The latest allegation is that Volkswagen, Porsche and Audi  —all owned by the Volkswagen Group—together with Mercedes-maker Daimler and BMW have engaged in collusive practices since the 1990s, including on emissions-reducing technology linked to the VW fraud revealed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2015. The European Union’s top antitrust regulator has confirmed that it is investigating the industry following a tipoff from VW last year. More than €11 billion ($12.8 billion) has been wiped off the combined market value of the three listed groups since the weekly magazine Der Spiegel published details of what it labeled “the cartel” on Friday.

How to Reduce Germany’s Surplus

Hans-Werner Sinn

Hans-Werner Sinn, Professor of Economics and Public Finance at the University of Munich, was President of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research and serves on the German economy ministry’s Advisory Council. He is the author, most recently, of The Euro Trap: On Bursting Bubbles, Budgets, and Beliefs.

JUL 21, 2017 Project Syndicate

MUNICH – The Economist was right when it recently reported that Germany’s current-account surplus is too high. But why is the German surplus too high? Some say that Germany has a high export volume because it manufactures high-quality products, while others argue that Germany imports too little, because its wages are too low.

Still others point out that, by definition, a country’s current-account surplus is equal to its capital exports. Germany thus has a surplus of savings over investments, and needs to save less and invest more.

Of course, the German current account surplus also reflects deficits in other countries, not least the United States, which accounts for about one third of the value of current-account deficits worldwide. So, one could just as soon call on deficit countries to increase their competitiveness, reduce wages, and save more while investing less.

Where Will Banks Go After Brexit? Frankfurt Takes Early Lead

Date: 19-07-2017
Source: The Wall Street Journal

Germany is favored for its well-educated workforce that speaks English, reasonable costs and a reliable regulatory environment

The Frankfurt skyline with its banking district.

Frankfurt Main Finance, the group tasked at promoting the financial center, estimates over 10,000 jobs will come to the city in the next six years as a result of Brexit. That is still a fraction of the more than 700,000 people who work in financial and related services in London.

FRANKFURT—Germany’s financial hub is taking an early lead in attracting banking businesses in anticipation of Britain exiting the European Union. Its main asset: It is predictable.

Banks from Japan’s Nomura Holdings Inc. and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group to Citigroup Inc. are shifting some business to Frankfurt given the possibility that the U.K. will be left out of the single market once Brexit happens. This would leave banks in London without so-called passporting rights that allow financial-services providers in the City to serve customers across the continent.

The Politics of Germany’s External Surplus

Clemens Fuest

Clemens Fuest is President of the Ifo Institute and Professor of Economics at the University of Munich.

JUL 17, 2017 Project Syndicate

MUNICH – The debate about global macroeconomic imbalances is increasingly focusing on Germany’s current-account surplus and economic policy. Despite the vitality of the German economic engine, and the role it plays in fueling growth and maintaining stability in the eurozone, criticism of the country’s massive external surplus is mounting. As the Economist put it recently, Germany “saves too much and spends too little,” making it “an awkward defender of free trade.”

So what is Germany to do? The answer depends on whether economics, or politics, is guiding the decision-making.

The current criticism, which provided what one observer called an “uneasy ambiance” at this month’s G20 summit in Hamburg, focuses on two claims. First, Germany is hurting itself by exporting too much and investing too little at home. Second, Germany withholds demand from the rest of the world, in particular the US. If Germany contributed more to global spending, according to this view, the economic recovery from the 2008 financial crisis would have been stronger.

Dividenden: Des Anlegers unterschätzter Freund

Alexander Hahn, 16. Juli 2017, 10:00 derstandad.at

Ob als Beiwerk oder als ausgewählte Strategie: Dividenden sind für Anleger ein interessantes Instrument. Doch was sagt die Dividendenrendite aus, und wer bestimmt die Höhe?

Wien – Für viele Aktienanleger gelten Dividenden nur als willkommenes Beibrot, eigentlich hoffen sie jedoch auf üppige Kursgewinne. Dass diese selbst über längere Zeiträume keineswegs gewiss sind, zeigt die genaue Betrachtung des österreichischen Leitindex ATX und seines deutschen Pendants Dax in den vergangenen zehn Jahren. Während das Wiener Börsenbarometer mehr als ein Drittel unter dem Stand von 2007, also unmittelbar vor der Finanzkrise, notiert, hat der Dax heuer wieder neue Rekordmarken erklommen. Ein Plus von 56 Prozent steht seither zu Buche. Den Dax deshalb als Kursrakete zu betrachten täuscht jedoch, werden bei ihm doch als sogenannter Performanceindex – im Gegensatz zum ATX – die Dividenden der Unternehmen mit eingerechnet. Lässt man die Ausschüttungen außen vor und betrachtet allein die Kursentwicklung der Indexfirmen, ergibt sich ein wesentlich bescheideneres Bild. Dann kommen Anleger in zehn Jahren bloß auf knapp 13 Prozent Wertzuwachs. Diesen gewaltigen Unterschied, immerhin fast 43 Prozentpunkte in der Wertentwicklung, machen allein die Ausschüttungen der Unternehmen aus.

Germany fears Donald Trump will divide Europe

Date: 13-07-2017
Source: The Economist
Angela Merkel is troubled by the president’s chumminess with Putin and Poland

IN THE aftermath of the G20 summit on July 7th and 8th, German politicians traded blows over who was at fault for riots by anti-globalisation activists that smashed up parts of central Hamburg. But a big global event in the heart of a city with a strong anarchist tradition was always bound to prompt protests. Officials’ deeper reasons for anxiety were different: Donald Trump and his attitudes towards Russia and Poland.

To some in Berlin, the president’s meeting with Vladimir Putin was a “Yalta 2.0”, a 21st-century equivalent of the summit in 1945 at which Americans and Russians divided Europe. Angela Merkel saw Mr Trump’s “back-slapping and face-pulling” display before the Russian president (as the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, a daily, put it) as undermining her efforts to confront Russia over Ukraine. An internal memo by the German foreign ministry summarising the G20 noted: “The summit went very well for Russia…As long as the US breaks rank, Russia can swim in the mainstream.”

Österreich verdiente 240 Millionen Euro mit Griechenland-Hilfe

András Szigetvari12. Juli 2017, 16:09 derstandard.at

Bisher sind 111 Millionen an Zinsen an das Finanzministerium geflossen. Die Nationalbank erzielte einen Erlös von 190 Millionen

Wien – Eine Anfrage der deutschen Grünen an Finanzminister Wolfgang Schäuble hat frischen Wind in eine alte Debatte über den Stellenwert der europäischen Solidarität gebracht. Die Grünen wollten von dem CDU-Politiker wissen, wie viel Gewinn die Bundesrepublik mit den Nothilfen für das hoch verschuldete Griechenland gemacht habe. Über 1,3 Milliarden Euro seien es gewesen, berichtete die „Süddeutsche Zeitung“. Nicht allein die Deutschen haben sich mit den Griechenland-Programmen ein Körberlgeld verdient – sondern auch Österreich, wie eine Anfrage des STANDARD zeigt. Österreich hatte Griechenland 2010 einen bilateralen Kredit in Höhe von rund 1,56 Milliarden Euro zur Verfügung gestellt. Dafür hat die Republik bisher 111,44 Millionen Millionen an Zinsen erhalten. Das sind nicht die einzigen Einnahmen der Republik. Auf dem Höhepunkt der Schuldenkrise hatte die Europäische Zentralbank (EZB) begonnen, in einem ersten, damals noch zögerlich aufgesetzten Notprogramm Staatsanleihen von Krisenländern zu kaufen. Die EZB erwarb dabei auch massenhaft griechische Staatspapiere.

Bis zum Februar 2012 hatte die Notenbank griechische Anleihen im Wert von gut 42,7 Milliarden Euro gekauft. Danach wurde das Kaufprogramm beendet. Die griechische Regierung muss seither auf die Anleihen Zinsen bezahlen.

Auch Nationalbank beteiligte sich

The G20’s Harmony Without Trump

Jeffrey D. Sachs

Jeffrey D. Sachs, Professor of Sustainable Development and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University, is Director of Columbia’s Center for Sustainable Development and of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. His books include The End of Poverty, Common Wealth, The Age of Sustainable Development, and, most recently, Building the New American Economy.

JUL 11, 2017 Project Syndicate

MEDELLÍN – O Freunde, nicht diese Töne! (Oh friends, not these sounds!), proclaimed the baritone in the stirring performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to the G20 leaders in Hamburg last Friday evening. That soul-stirring phrase, the opening line of “Ode to Joy,” Beethoven’s appeal to universal brotherhood, was the perfect message to the global leaders sitting in the concert hall’s balcony. The G20 President, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, actually made remarkable headway in channeling Beethoven’s spirit.

This G20 summit, of course, was the first with Donald Trump as US President. The summit’s discordant tones, echoed in the stormy sections of Beethoven’s symphony, emanated entirely from the United States. Trump has no use for appeals to brotherly love. He traffics in ethnic and religious divisiveness, hostility to neighbors (insisting again at the summit that the US will build a wall on the Mexican border and that Mexico will pay for it), and Manichean images of a Western civilization vulnerable to collapse at the hands of radical Islam, rather than at the height of unimaginable wealth and technological prowess.

France, Germany and the EU: The European Motor Sputters to Life

Date: 11-07-2017
Source: SPIEGEL

Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Emmanuel Macron hope to reinvigorate the Franco-German partnership. Yet even as military cooperation moves forward, the two countries are still far apart on eurozone reforms.

French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

When Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron talk about their relationship, it’s easy to get the impression that they are a pair of lovers. „There’s a bit of magic in every new beginning,“ warbled the German chancellor during Macron’s visit to Berlin. The French president, for his part, wasn’t at a loss for ardor when he went before the press with Merkel at the end of the last EU summit. „When France and Germany speak with one voice, Europe makes headway,“ he gushed.

It’s hardly surprising that Brussels no longer speaks of two people when the pair comes up in conversation. „Mercron“ or „Emmangela“ is how the two are now referred to in the European Union capital, names that reflect the hope that Merkel and Macron, the German chancellor and French president, will re-start the German-French EU motor and finally bring the bloc forward. And the current situation is propitious: The election of Donald Trump in the United States and the ongoing political disaster unfolding in Britain has recently reminded many Europeans of just how important the EU really is.

Deutsche Ökonomen gegen Änderungen an Agenda 2010

Fast 90 Prozent der rund 130 befragten Wirtschaftsprofessoren schreiben dem Ifo zufolge der Agenda 2010 eine starke Wirkung auf die günstige Entwicklung der Arbeitslosigkeit zu.

 10.07.2017 um 07:52,diepresse.com

Deutsche Volkswirte sind mit der Reform des Arbeitsmarktes durch die „Agenda 2010“ von Kanzler Gerhard Schröder zufrieden und sprechen sich mit großer Mehrheit gegen Veränderungen aus, wie sie die heutige SPD in ihrem Wahlprogramm vorschlägt. Das berichtet das Münchner ifo Institut in einer Aussendung. Aus dem Ökonomenpanel, einer Umfrage des ifo mit FAZ, gehe hervor, dass fast 90 Prozent der rund 130 befragten Wirtschaftsprofessoren der „Agenda 2010“ eine starke oder sehr starke Wirkung auf die günstige Entwicklung der Arbeitslosigkeit und die Zunahme der Beschäftigung zuschreiben.