In 2019, the Bundesbank achieved a net profit of 5.8 billion euros. After adjustment of the reserves, the net profit is 5.9 billion euros, the highest net profit since 2008, which the Bundesbank transferred in full to the Federal Ministry of Finance.

Recently, many central banks have begun communicating not just their current monetary policy, but also its probable predicted future path. However, the effectiveness of this communication hinges on how strongly it is able to influence the inflation expectations of households and firms. A standard property of macroeconomic models is that expectations respond very strongly to such announcements. A new theoretical study shows that the effects are much smaller in a model capable of matching survey evidence on expectations formation.

The February 2020 edition of the Monthly Report comments on the economic situation in Germany in winter 2019/2020.