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Banks from Italy, Ireland, Spain and Austria fared worst in the latest European Union stress test, which the region’s banking watchdog said on Friday showed there was still work to do in order to boost credit to the bloc’s economy. Eight years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers sparked a global banking meltdown, many of Europe’s banks are still saddled with billions of euros in poorly performing loans, crimping their ability to lend and putting off investors. “While a number of individual banks have clearly fared badly, the overall finding of the European Banking Authority — that Europe’s banks are...

Germany’s largest lender is set to shut over a quarter of its branches across the country as the company goes through a major restructuring process. The closures are set to take place over the next few months, with 188 of Deutsche Bank’s 723 branches nationwide due to close their doors. […] After recording colossal losses of around €7 billion in 2015, the Frankfurt lender is desperately seeking ways to cut costs. […] The bank said it hopes to redirect funds to digital banking, in which it hopes to invest €750 million by 2020. …

Fourteen years after the introduction of the Euro in cash, Germans are still holding onto their Deutschmarks (DM), mainly for the sentimental value attached to them. The DM, which was introduced in West Germany in 1948 under Allied rule and adopted in East Germany in 1990, was replaced by the Euro in 2002. On the 31st of December 2001, DM banknotes to the value of €76.57 billion were in circulation. Since then, “more than 95% of DM banknotes in circulation have been exchanged” for Euros, Dorit Feldbrügge from the Bundesbank (German Central Bank) told The Local. But that means that...

The US President warned the UK would be “at the back of the queue” for a trade deal with America if it quit Brussels. But his threat provoked outrage and scorn from pro-Brexit campaigners, who dismissed it as yet another scaremongering ploy from the pro-EU lobby. Mr Obama, who will no longer be in office when decisions on a trade deal are made, delivered a lecture to the British people on why he thinks it is in the UK’s, America’s and the world’s best interests for Britain to vote to stay in the EU on June 23. He weighed into...

Vivos founder and CEO Robert Vicino announced Vivos Europa One which will be an invitation only, five star, underground survival complex, similar to an underground cruise ship for the elite. Each family will be provided a private 2,500 square foot of floor area, capable of two story improvements for a total of 5,000 square feet of private living quarters. With fit and finish comparable to a mega-yacht, each member family will hire their own architect and contractor to build out their living quarters to the custom standard they desire. The expansive shelter is located in Germany and is one of...

The European Union is sending mixed signals on business transparency. On Tuesday, the European Commission responded to the Panama Papers disclosures by unveiling new legislation that would force more tax transparency on major companies in member states. But on Thursday, the European Parliament voted in favor of a new measure that critics say could prevent such leaks in the future. Campaigners say the new Trade Secrets Protection Act — aimed at protecting multinationals from corporate spying — will effectively criminalize whistleblowers and make it less likely that revelations like the Panama Papers and the Volkswagen scandal will ever see the...

If Britain leaves the EU after its referendum in June, it won’t just affect Brits, but people from across Europe — none of whom will get a vote. Now Europeans can get involved — by love-bombing their British friends to encourage them to stay. The idea came from a group of Europeans living in London, who have launched a group called #PleaseDon’tGoUK. Their idea is simple: forget the debates and show the Brits some love — and then post the evidence online. […] The group has had contributions from French people, Italians, Germans, Spaniards and Swedes, both in the UK...

Locals in Hanover have been given a very specific command for when the US President comes to visit — better neither heard nor seen. When US President Barack Obama arrives in Hanover for a visit on Sunday April 24th, residents have been told very clearly what is expected of them: stay away from windows and do not wave. Local police issued advisory flyers out of security concerns for some 1,800 residents who live near the Congress Centrum and zoo area, where Obama will be meeting Chancellor Angela Merkel for the Hanover Messe, a major global trade fair for industrial technology....

The German government on Monday said it hoped the revelations from the so-called “Panama Papers” will spur global efforts to combat tax evasion and money laundering. “We hope the current debate will turn up the heat,” finance ministry spokesman Martin Jäger told a news briefing. […] The Panama Papers are a massive leak of 11.5 million documents allegedly exposing the secret offshore dealings of a host of world leaders, celebrities and sports stars, implicating figures from Russian President Vladimir Putin to Barcelona striker Lionel Messi. […] The documents, from around 214,000 offshore entities covering almost 40 years, came from Mossack...

Thousands of soldiers marched solemnly Sunday through the crowded streets of Dublin to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Ireland’s Easter Rising against Britain, a fateful rebellion that reduced parts of the capital to ruins and fired the country’s flame of independence. The Easter parade through Dublin featured military ceremonies at key buildings seized in 1916, when about 1,200 rebels sought to fuel a popular revolt against Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom. […] Many Dubliners opposed the insurrection as an act of treason in time of war, but public sentiment swiftly swung in the rebels’ favor once a newly arrived...

A British vote to leave the European Union could cost the economy £100 billion and 950,000 jobs by 2020, according to research commissioned by employers' group the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). The CBI said "Brexit" would deliver a serious shock to the British economy, regardless of any trade deals the country could negotiate with its former European partners. "This analysis shows very clearly why leaving the European Union would be a real blow for living standards, jobs and growth," CBI Director-General Carolyn Fairbairn said in a statement on Monday. "The savings from reduced EU budget contributions and regulation are...

Income inequality has leapt in Germany since 2000, a new study shows, with the lowest earners having less money in their pockets than 15 years ago despite sustained economic growth. The study by the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau, a government-owned development bank, shows how unevenly the fruits of prosperity have been divided over the past decade and a half. Whereas in 2000 Germany had arguably the lowest income inequality in the world, it has now fallen behind the Czech Republic, Sweden and Denmark. The report does however emphasize that Germany is still one of the most equal countries in the world...

Last week, European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi (shown) tried to do an impression of former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. Although "Helicopter Ben" — he of the massive, innovative "stimulus" monetary policies enacted in response to the Great Recession, which pumped trillions of new dollars into the global economy — has been retired from the helm of the Fed for several years, he casts a very long shadow indeed. Draghi's own newly enacted stimulus, designed to boost Europe out of persistent economic malaise, not only takes a few pages out of the Bernanke playbook, it moves central banking into...

This is as good as it gets for Germany and Europe. Previously, it was the debt of the eurozone’s peripheral countries that was of concern to the markets. But in an interview with Business Insider, Geopolitical Futures founder George Friedman proclaimed that Europe now has a much bigger problem: Germany. And at the heart of the looming issue for Germany and Europe is the Italian banking system. “[Problems in Italian banks are] going to spill over into the Netherlands, it’s going to spill over into Germany,” Friedman said. “Germany is the new PIIG. Germany depends on exports and its markets...

Germany should play a bigger role in world affairs, Chancellor Angela Merkel insisted on Wednesday. On the campaign trail for her Christian Democrats (CDU) party ahead of regional elections next week, Merkel refused pressure to take a more individual, domestic approach to Europe's migrant crisis. The country should not just spread its influence via, exports, the chancellor argued. "Rather, we will have to take on more responsibility in an open world for what happens outside our European borders," she said from a CDU rally in the town of Wittlich in Rhineland-Palatinate, one of three states about to hold parliamentary ballots....

Europe's leaders convening in Brussels on Thursday for an European Union summit are under intense pressure to come up with a new plan to save the euro, but they seem as divided as ever. Chancellor Angela Merkel used uncommonly stark language on Tuesday when she rejected the idea for common euro bonds by saying Europe would not share total debt liability "as long as I live." But German media commentators have drawn some comfort from a blueprint for a radical revamp of the eurozone's architecture presented this week by the "gang of four" European presidents: European Council President Herman Van...

Germany's financial regulator has said it won't take further action against the country's largest bank over alleged interest rate rigging and precious metals price fixing. The moves takes the spotlight off a former boss. The watchdog, known as Bafin, announced on Thursday it had ended several major special audits against Deutsche Bank. [...] Deutsche Bank paid $2.5 billion (2.26 billion euros) in fines in April last year after investigations on manipulating interest rates. The bank was also probed for its role in rigging prices of gold, silver, platinum and palladium. It also recorded a multibillion-euro loss for 2015. Bafin officials...

London: Twelve former senior military officers insisted Britain should stay in the European Union today, saying the country was "stronger" as a member of the 28-nation bloc in a "dangerous world". Writing ahead of a membership referendum on June 23, the retired military chiefs said the EU helped protect the country against threats from ISIS terrorists and Russia. The signatories of the letter to the Daily Telegraph newspaper include four former professional heads of the overall armed forces as well as two former heads of the army and two of the navy. "Will Britain be safer inside the EU or...

A survey published on Wednesday shows 44 percent of Germans want the government to set an upper limit on how much companies can pay their employees. The number of respondents in favour of Germany setting a maximum salary clearly outweighed those who were against it, with only slightly over a quarter saying it was a bad idea. Twenty-nine percent, meanwhile, were undecided, the survey by Die Zeit showed. The idea was particularly popular in former communist east Germany, where a majority of 58 percent said they wanted salaries capped.

... If the European Union were a patient, its survival would be seen as threatened by multiple organ failure. That's the view of many experts as EU chiefs prepare for a Brussels summit that starts Thursday. Analysts believe the combined strain of these challenges may be unbearable for a political union and trading bloc that just 20 years ago seemed to be growing in stature as it proudly offered freedom and democracy - along with lucrative subsidies, military alliances and billions in foreign investment - to newly freed former Soviet satellites. Ian Kearns, director of the European Leadership Network research...