German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced the transfer of another Iris-T air defense system to Ukraine, the German defense ministry’s social network X reported on Friday.
“We have once again delivered to Ukraine a combined fire unit consisting of the IRIS T SLM and IRIS T SLS, a modern and well-proven medium and short-range air defense system, directly from the German industry,” Pistorius said.
He noted that the new air defense system will strengthen Ukraine’s air defense along with the recently delivered Patriot system.
Germany is ready to quickly redirect proceeds from frozen Russian assets to help Ukraine, Reuters reports.
“If there is a legally possible mechanism that will allow us to better manage these financial flows from frozen assets in the future, we are definitely open,” the publication quotes its sources in the German Ministry of Finance as saying.
At the same time, Reuters reports that Germany insists that it is ready to confiscate only the income from Russian sovereign assets, not the assets themselves. According to the German Ministry of Finance, this approach will allow to comply with the fundamental principle of sovereign immunity of states.
It is reported that next week this issue will be discussed at a meeting of the G7 finance ministers in Italy, to which Ukraine has also been invited.
Germany’s central bank expects the country’s economy to grow in April-June for the second consecutive quarter after falling at the end of 2023.
According to preliminary calculations of the statutory office of the Federal Republic of Germany, in January-March GDP increased by 0.2% compared to the previous three months. It fell 0.5% in October-December 2023.
“The economy is likely to expand slightly again in the second quarter,” the Bundesbank said in a statement on Wednesday.
Activity in the services sector was likely to have continued to strengthen on the back of rising household income and consumer spending.
“Growth in household disposable income is likely to take the upper hand from consumer uncertainty,” Central Bank analysts suggested.
However, they noted that the construction sector remains very weak.
The German labor market is expected to remain resilient and wages look set to continue to rise rapidly. This could be a risk to cooling inflation, which the Bundesbank estimates will accelerate slightly again in May.
The final data on Germany’s first-quarter GDP dynamics will be released on May 24, while preliminary information for the second quarter will be presented on July 30.
Earlier Experts Club analytical center and Maxim Urakin released a video analysis of how the GDP of the world’s countries has changed over the past years, more detailed video analysis is available here – https://youtu.be/w5fF_GYyrIc?si=BsZmIUERHSBJrO_3.
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CENTRAL BANK, ECONOMY, EXPERTS CLUB, GDP, GERMANY, MACROECONOMICS, URAKIN
Ukrainians with residence and work permits will be able to stay in Germany despite the Ukrainian state’s desire to return citizens living abroad to participate in the war against Russia, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said during a speech at an event of the RND newspaper group, according to Dw.
“The legal situation is such that residence here is not questioned. Employment also leads to security of residence,” he said.
The chancellor also called on Ukrainians in Germany to find employment.
“We hope that those who came from Ukraine will work as soon as they are able to work. It is worth saying that many are already doing so, but there are still several hundred thousand who are urgently needed in the labor market,” he emphasized.
The German government will donate about 400 generators to Ukraine to help fight Russian aggression, the German Embassy in Kyiv reports.
“Recent Russian air strikes have destroyed and damaged power plants in Ukraine. Millions of people, especially in Sumy and Kharkiv, were temporarily left without electricity. The German government is supplying > 400 generators to strengthen Ukraine in its fight against Russian aggression,” the statement posted on Facebook reads.
Germany’s economy will avoid recession in 2024, but will grow by only 0.1% due to declining exports and weak domestic demand, according to leading German research institutes.
The previous forecast, prepared by the Munich-based Institute for Economic Research (IFO), the Kiel-based Institute for World Economics (IfW), the Rhineland-Westphalian Institute for Economic Research in Essen (RWI) and the Institute for Economic Research in Halle (IWH), predicted German GDP growth of 1.3%.
In 2023, the German economy shrank by 0.3%.
The economists warned that domestic demand is growing more slowly than expected, and exports are suffering due to high electricity prices, which reduce the competitiveness of German energy-intensive goods.
“Cyclical and structural factors are leading to a weakening of economic growth,” said Stefan Koots, head of economic research at the IfW. – “A recovery may begin in the spring, but overall, the growth momentum will not be very strong.
In 2025, according to experts, Germany’s GDP growth will accelerate to 1.4%.
The forecast for inflation for 2024 is 2.3%, for 2025 – 1.8%.
Earlier, Experts Club analytical center released a video analysis of GDP changes in major countries, the video is available at https://youtu.be/w5fF_GYyrIc?si=EpL-_EmhIGfMURGl
