Germany’s current account recorded a surplus of €11.0 billion in January 2022, down €13.6 billion on the previous month’s level. The surplus in the goods account declined considerably, with the surplus in invisible current transactions, which comprise services as well as primary and secondary income, contracting even more strongly.

Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel has warned of persistently high inflation. “Even before the war against Ukraine, the inflation rate was very high. [...] Given the surge in energy prices on account of the war, consumer price inflation is likely to pick up again substantially, particularly in the near term,” Mr Nagel said in a speech delivered at a change of office ceremony in Hanover. As members of the ECB Governing Council, he remarked, we must now ensure that the strong inflation does not become entrenched and does not lead to excessively high inflation in the medium term.

Der EZB-Rat hat heute beschlossen, die drei Leitzinssätze der EZB um jeweils 75 Basispunkte anzuheben. Mit dieser dritten großen Leitzinserhöhung in Folge haben wir erhebliche Fortschritte bei der Rücknahme der geldpolitischen Akkommodierung erzielt. Wir haben den heutigen Beschluss gefasst – und gehen davon aus, dass wir die Zinsen weiter anheben werden –, um eine zeitnahe Rückkehr der Inflation auf das mittelfristige 2 %-Ziel zu gewährleisten. Wir werden den künftigen Leitzinspfad an der Entwicklung der Inflations- und Wirtschaftsaussichten ausrichten. Dabei folgen wir dem Ansatz, Zinsschritte von Sitzung zu Sitzung festzulegen.

In the current issue of its Monthly Report, the Bundesbank uses scenario calculations to analyse the potential macroeconomic impact of a further escalation of the war against Ukraine. According to the experts, German real GDP this year could be down by as much as 2% compared with 2021. The inflation rate in Germany in 2022 could be 1½ percentage points higher than expected in the European Central Bank’s March projection.

At the end of the second quarter of 2017, households' financial assets amounted to €5,723 billion; this figure was just over €45 billion (or 0.8%) higher than in the first quarter of 2017. As valuation losses reduced financial wealth by roughly €8 billion, the rise was solely attributable to the transaction-based acquisition of financial assets