Last year saw a worldwide fall in sales of passenger cars. According to the Bundesbank, a further decline seems likely for the current year. The Bundesbank Monthly Report for May states that this is due mainly to special developments regionally.

The German economy got off to a good start in 2019. Real gross domestic product (GDP) in the first quarter of 2019 was up 0.4% on the quarter. However, one-off effects played an important role in this, as revealed by the Bundesbank’s latest Monthly Report.

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann says that non-standard monetary policy measures can have a variety of effects on income and wealth distribution. “Much like conventional interest rate policy, the non-standard measures are more likely to have reduced income inequality,” he said in a speech in Hamburg.

Bundesbank Executive Board member Burkhard Balz says that more needs to be done to build confidence in blockchain networks. Permissioned networks might be one way forward, he explained at an event in Frankfurt am Main.

Diana Rutzka-Hascher, previously President of the Bundesbank’s Regional Office in Hesse, is now head of the Bank's Directorate General Human Resources at Central Office, while HR chief Thomas Ollinger has taken her position as the new President of the Regional Office. Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann congratulated the two officials at a function in Frankfurt am Main attended by around 170 invited guests.

Federal President of Germany Frank-Walter Steinmeier has appointed Jens Weidmann President of the Bundesbank for another eight years, with effect from 1 May. At Schloss Bellevue in Berlin, the Federal President presented Mr Weidmann with the certificate of appointment for his second term of office.

In their first-ever joint exhibition, the National Bank of Belgium and the Deutsche Bundesbank will put works from their respective art collections on public display. The exhibition “Building a Dialogue. Two Corporate Collections of Contemporary Art” shows works by 44 artists in total. The exhibition can be viewed in the renovated modernist counter hall of the National Bank of Belgium, located in the centre of Brussels.

Experts from the Bundesbank have criticised the common European budgetary rules and their implementation as becoming less and less comprehensible and predictable. They are calling for reforms to restrengthen the rules’ binding force.

NGFS calls for action by central banks, supervisors and all relevant stakeholders for greening the financial system.

The German economy grew moderately in the first quarter of 2019. However, in the Bundesbank’s assessment, the still positive development was largely attributable to one-off effects. The Bundesbank's economists write that the already booming construction sector profited further from the favourable weather in February, for example.