Cash remains the most frequently used means of payment at the point of sale in Germany. This is one of the findings of the Bundesbank’s latest study on payment behaviour in Germany for 2023. However, card and mobile payments are gaining significant ground, while the share of cash payments is declining. Although this decline is no longer as pronounced as during the coronavirus pandemic, the share of cash payments is falling faster than in previous years,” said Executive Board member Burkhard Balz.

In cooperation with the Dutch and Swedish central banks, the Bundesbank invited participants to an international conference on macroprudential topics. This year’s event in Eltville am Rhein addressed issues such as tackling interest rate risk, capital buffers for banks and non-standard monetary policy. The keynote speaker was Tobias Adrian of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The tax wedge on labour – i.e. the burden of taxes and social security contributions on labour income – is a frequently discussed topic. An article from the Bundesbank’s current Monthly Report examines the tax wedge on labour in greater detail. It looks, in particular, at the difference between pension contributions and tax payments. “A nuanced analysis of tax wedge ratios makes an important contribution to enabling better interpretation of tax wedges,” the authors of the article write. 

The Bundesbank has unveiled its TIA platform, enabling staff across the institution to harness artificial intelligence. Users can configure text-based intelligent assistants (TIAs) to their particular requirements and share them with others. And they don’t need to write a single line of code to do so, because state-of-the-art technology can digitalise processes in less than five minutes.