German economy rebounds faster than expected

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Thanas
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German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by Thanas »

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German exports increased by 23.3% and imports by 18.3% in March 2010 on March 2009. After seasonal adjustment, exports rose by 10.7% and imports by 11.0% compared with February 2010.

The German federal statistics office, Destatis, reported today that Germany exported commodities to the value of €85.6bn and imported commodities to the value of €68.4bn in March 2010. The foreign trade balance showed a surplus of €17.2bn in March 2010. In March 2009, the surplus amounted to €11.6bn. After seasonal adjustment, the foreign trade balance recorded a surplus of €13.3bn in March 2010.

According to provisional data from the Deutsche Bundesbank, the current account of the balance of payments showed a surplus of €18.0bn in March 2010, which included the balance of services (+€0.8bn), factor income net (+€4.0bn), current transfers (–€2.7bn), and supplementary trade items (–€1.2bn). In March 2009, the German current account showed a surplus of €12.3bn.
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Looks like Germany might have weathered the crisis. This announcement comes closely after Mercedes Benz announced that it would start to produce at the usual level once more.

Also, German unemployment is lower by over 100.000 people compared to last year's month and is currently still falling month after month.

More information (in German).
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by CJvR »

Thanas wrote:Looks like Germany might have weathered the crisis.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by Skgoa »

Huh? Greece is not so much an economic problem, but a political and social one. And more for the greek government and the EU. As long as Spain stays stable, there will be no big or even threatening problems for Germany.
edit: The greek economy is so tiny compared to the german one and Greece is so far away from central europe, that really not that much fallout can reach us.
Last edited by Skgoa on 2010-05-10 05:54pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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Good for Germany, I guess. Its nice to hear some good news for a change.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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Skgoa wrote:Huh? Greece is not so much an economic problem, but a political and social one. And more for the greek government and the EU. As long as Spain stays stable, there will be no big or even threatening problems for Germany.
edit: The greek economy is so tiny compared to the german one and Greece is so far away from central europe, that really not that much fallout can reach us.
The problem is a ton of European banks have all kinds of loans and debt arrangements with Greece, there's a few hundred billion Euros worth of them and depending on what happens in Greece a good portion of them could go bad and blow up a bunch of banks and other countries. You end up with a domino effect in the banking system which has the potential to really screw things up. Basically, it's like the Lehmans' or Bear Stearns situation in the US back in 2008, you'd think that the 2 smallest investment banks wouldn't have much of an impact on the US economy as a whole, yet they managed to set off a chain reaction that killed the US economy. That's the greatly simplified version anyway.

With regards to Germany, well, you guys actually manufacture tangible goods instead of just engaging in financial fraud and calling it productivity like many other countries. If you guys don't do anything too stupid you'll make off better than most of Europe and get a chance to buy up the entire continent after everyone else fails.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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Germany relies on the rest of the EU for exports. If the EU flounders, Germany's mercantilist economy does. It's in your best interests to prop up Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Italy, because if they nosedive, you go with them. Germany does have $250bn invested in other EU nation's bonds after all. And that is the end of the European experiment in a superstate single currency.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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Admiral Valdemar wrote:Germany relies on the rest of the EU for exports. If the EU flounders, Germany's mercantilist economy does. It's in your best interests to prop up Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Italy, because if they nosedive, you go with them. And that is the end of the European experiment in a superstate single currency.
You are correct. We could pretty much do without Greece, but loosing any of the others would be very bad for the German Economy as well.
aerius wrote: The problem is a ton of European banks have all kinds of loans and debt arrangements with Greece, there's a few hundred billion Euros worth of them and depending on what happens in Greece a good portion of them could go bad and blow up a bunch of banks and other countries.
Meh. If necessary, we'll bailout the banks. It is not as if we haven't gotten enough experience in how to do it...the real trouble is Spain, Portugal or Italy.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by LaCroix »

Although this might be the opportunity for what Germans have claimed for years - Bring Mallorca home... And buy Greece. After all , you could get Greece for a bargain right now, and it's certainly not worse than bringing east Germany up to speed. So ~ten years, and everything runs pretty smoothly, then. :mrgreen:
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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LaCroix wrote:Although this might be the opportunity for what Germans have claimed for years - Bring Mallorca home... And buy Greece. After all , you could get Greece for a bargain right now, and it's certainly not worse than bringing east Germany up to speed. So ~ten years, and everything runs pretty smoothly, then. :mrgreen:
No thanks. Eastern Germany is still not up to speed and we had a lot more resources to throw at them than we have now.

Also, we then would have to deal with the Greek populace.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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I see that you do not disapprove of the possibility to buy Mallorca in the future... German to the bone... :lol:
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

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LaCroix wrote:I see that you do not disapprove of the possibility to buy Mallorca in the future... German to the bone... :lol:

Mallorca already is a German Kolonie. The only thing that would need changing would be the main flag.

Also, I have a soft spot for the Spanish.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by UnderAGreySky »

Wouldn't a lot of this be down to the falling Euro? It's lost 15% in the last four months. This helps exports, at least. The problem of course is the fall doesn't help Greece, because people would still rather do business in Germany not Greece, so prices stay the same across the board. Oops.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by LaCroix »

If it were due to the Euro, we would see such a quick rebound in every European country. So it is the demand for German products.
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Re: German economy rebounds faster than expected

Post by Thanas »

UnderAGreySky wrote:Wouldn't a lot of this be down to the falling Euro? It's lost 15% in the last four months. This helps exports, at least. The problem of course is the fall doesn't help Greece, because people would still rather do business in Germany not Greece, so prices stay the same across the board. Oops.
Keep in mind that this is March we are talking about, which means contracts were signed before march, probably in January or so.
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