BKann die Geldpolitik die Ungleichheit bei Einkommen und Vermögen verringern? Welche Rolle können Notenbanken bei der Bewältigung des Klimawandels spielen? Und wie kann die Bundesbank junge Menschen besser erreichen? Bei der digitalen Ausgabe von Euro20+ beantwortete Bundesbankpräsident Jens Weidmann viele durchaus kritische Fragen der über 100 Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmer.

The Bundesbank will be hosting its third cash symposium on 13 June. Senior representatives from the business community, civil society and academia will be convening there for an exchange on cash-related matters. Speakers include Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, former President of the Federal Constitutional Court Hans-Jürgen Papier and philosopher Richard David Precht.

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann believes that the Eurosystem should use the pre-crisis toolkit as a benchmark for monetary policy normalisation. In remarks made in Frankfurt am Main, Weidmann said: “If and how monetary policy should adapt its toolbox can only be assessed after we have progressed on the path of normalisation.”

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann has spoken out in favour of taking advantage of the good global economic outlook to implement reforms. It is now vital to "push ahead with structural reforms that put national economies on a path of sustainable, higher growth," he said at a joint press conference with Federal Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble on the sidelines of the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Washington, DC.

According to the Bundesbank’s latest projections, the German economy will gradually emerge from its current lull. They indicate that, although calendar-adjusted real gross domestic product (GDP) is likely to grow by only around ½% next year, as it did this year, 2021 and 2022 could each see distinctly stronger growth of just under 1½%.

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann sees digitalisation as a development that could potentially influence the path of productivity, employment and inflation. Its impact could go in different directions, however, and this needs to be borne in mind when considering its possible repercussions for the room for monetary policy manoeuvre, he argued in a speech at the annual meeting of the German Economic Association (Verein für Socialpolitik) in Freiburg.

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann says that Germany and France must work in concert when it comes to reforming the EU. Speaking in Brussels, Mr Weidmann welcomed the reform proposals put forward by French President Emmanuel Macron, saying that they have provided significant impetus.

The Bundesbank is not distributing a profit to the Federal Government for 2020 – for the first time since 1979. The main reason was the greater level of risk provisioning, Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann explained at the press conference to present the annual accounts in Frankfurt am Main. In the previous year, the Bundesbank distributed a profit of €5.9 billion. On the whole, the emergency monetary policy measures taken in response to the coronavirus pandemic are having a noticeable impact on the Bundesbank’s balance sheet. 

Alexandre Lamfalussy, one of the founding fathers of the euro, passed away on 9 May at the age of 86. Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann praised him as one of the important pioneers of European monetary union.