Germany’s financial links with the rest of the world continued to increase in 2012.

The extensive package of measures taken to combat the sovereign debt crisis have led to risk being redistributed among the member states of the euro area, Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann told a conference in Venice. This, he said, undermines the necessary foundation for a stable and prosperous monetary union.

In a speech in Rome Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann pointed out that, in order to permanently stabilise the euro area, action and liability again must be aligned. This principle should apply not only to banks, but also for policy decisions in the euro area.

In the 1980s and 1990s, many countries began to approximate the Bundesbank model, making their central banks more independent and focusing on the goal of price stability. The highlight of these developments was undoubtedly the foundation of the European Central Bank (ECB), which was modelled on the Bundesbank.

The situation in the international financial markets is characterised by low interest rates and low volatility. The longer the period of low interest rates lasts, the greater the risk of exaggerations in certain market segments, Claudia Buch, Deputy President, and Andreas Dombret, Executive Board member, said at the presentation of the Deutsche Bundesbank's 2014 Financial Stability Review.