The Bundesbank has two stand-alone representative offices – one in New York and the other in Tokyo and many Bundesbank representatives, who are posted at German embassies or consulates general all over the world.

The Bundesbank’s representative offices in New York and Tokyo

Since 1986, the Bundesbank has had two stand-alone representative offices – in other words independent of the respective German diplomatic missions – in New York and Tokyo. The main task of the Bundesbank employees working at the representative offices is to report on the respective region’s economic developments and financial system. The Representative Office in New York is responsible for the United States, Canada and Mexico, while the Representative Office in Tokyo is in charge of Japan, Korea and Australia. It is crucial for employees representing the Bundesbank abroad to establish and maintain contact with experts from all the relevant institutions in the financial sector. In the context of personal discussions and presentations, these Bundesbank employees provide information on economic development in Germany and the euro area as well as the Bundesbank’s take on monetary policy and economic topics, thus acting as a mouthpiece of the Bundesbank. For several years now, trading activities important for managing German foreign reserves have been conducted in both representative offices. 

Bundesbank representatives in a further eleven financial centres

The creation of the Eurosystem as well as international cooperation in the context of the G20 and the Financial Stability Board require the Bundesbank to have an extensive and well-functioning network of representatives. Besides macroeconomic aspects, microprudential and macroprudential topics, too, are becoming more and more relevant to the work of central banks; at the same time, the importance of emerging economies for the global economy is growing. The Bundesbank is represented in Beijing, Brussels, Istanbul, London, Madrid, Mumbai, Paris, Pretoria, Rome, São Paulo and Singapore.  

The main task of a Bundesbank representative is to monitor and analyse the financial system. This includes identifying a looming financial crisis before it unfolds. Given how closely interconnected our economies are, even small, unsound developments which initially impact only the local economy may have sweeping repercussions for another country’s financial system and sometimes even for the global economy. A key lesson from the global financial crisis is that isolated national efforts are not sufficient to safeguard the stability of our financial system. With its network, the Bundesbank intends to keep track of virtually all countries, either directly or indirectly. For instance, the Bank’s representative in São Paulo keeps an eye on all the South American countries, while its representative in Singapore monitors all of South-East Asia. Moreover, the employees representing the Bundesbank abroad promote an exchange of knowledge in addition to establishing and maintaining a valuable personal network with central banks, financial authorities, supervisory authorities, banks and other institutions.