Due to the coronavirus pandemic, this year's Global Solutions Summit is being held as a virtual event. In his online speech to the Summit, Finance Minister Olaf Scholz focuses on the need for an international minimum tax in order to ensure that everyone contributes their fair share to the financing of public goods.

As of 1 February 2020, the United Kingdom is no longer a member of the European Union. Initially nothing will change for citizens and businesses, because a transition period will apply until the end of 2020. Our dedicated Brexit page includes important information on Brexit in the areas of financial markets, customs, budgetary issues and taxation.

A new task force is being set up to detect illicit tax schemes and large-scale tax fraud such as cum/ex arrangements more quickly and put a stop to them. This will make an important contribution to fair taxation. The strong and effective new task force will be located at the Federal Central Tax Office. It will support federal and Land (state) authorities in processing pending cases, act as a central contact point for detecting new tax schemes, and have the power to conduct its own investigations.

The Federation, Länder and local authorities can continue to expect higher tax revenues in the coming years. According to current tax estimates, tax revenues will rise from €796.4bn in 2019 to around €935.0bn in 2024. The trend will be somewhat better for the Länder and local authorities than for the Federation, however. Overall, the Working Party on Tax Revenue Estimates has corrected its revenue expectations slightly downwards.

On 18 October 2019, Federal Minister of Finance Olaf Scholz gave a speech on climate policy at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington on the sidelines of the annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank Group in Washington. He made the points that coordinated action against climate change will be the defining issue for foreign policy and that it will become a business opportunity.

On 16 October 2019, Minister of Finance Olaf Scholz participated in the Franco-German Ministerial Council in Toulouse, France. The French and German ministries of finance and economic affairs agreed on a new roadmap on economic and financial issues, with a special focus on exploring bilateral cooperation and developing common positions at the EU level.

Olaf Scholz, German Finance Minister, Wopke Hoekstra, Minister of Finance of the Netherlands and Bruno Le Maire, Minister of Economy and Finance of France, received the “Savings and Sustainable Investment Union” report by the Next Capital Markets Union High-Level Group on 9 October 2019. They thanked the Next CMU Group for their high-quality work and welcome the ambitious recommendations in a joint press statement that you can find here.

The second Fiscal Policy Seminar took place on 7-8 October 2019 at the Federal Ministry of Finance: 65 science and policy experts from twelve countries attended the seminar, titled “Analysing developments in savings, investments and interest rates – reassessing the role of fiscal policies for growth and stabilisation”. They analysed the developments of savings, investments and interest and discussed conclusions on how to implement fair fiscal policies.

German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz, German Economic Affairs Minister Peter Altmaier and their French counterpart Bruno Le Maire came together in Paris on 19 September 2019. They agreed to deliver a strategy for growth, strengthen the euro area, launch joint industry projects and protect the EU’s sovereignty over trade policy. The fight against climate change is a priority for both countries.

The German government has adopted a new blockchain strategy. This makes Germany one of the first countries to unveil a blueprint for taking advantage of the opportunities that blockchain technology offers and for harnessing its potential to advance digital transformation. It is one of the mostly widely discussed digital innovations that are currently transforming economies and societies.

At the meeting of eurozone finance ministers in Helsinki on 13 September 2019, Germany and France issued a joint statement on the digital currency Libra. Federal Minister of Finance Olaf Scholz and his French counterpart Bruno Le Maire oppose Facebook’s digital currency. They consider that the Libra project fails to convince that risks will be properly addressed.

The Federal Ministry of Finance and the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection have agreed on a package of measures to enhance investor protection. The measures expand the scope of BaFin’s powers for the supervision of financial products and their distribution. Capital investments are now subject to even stricter requirements.

This article provides basic international comparisons of certain major tax types. The comparisons cover the member states of the European Union plus several additional advanced economies (the United States, Canada, Japan, Switzerland and Norway) and generally reflect the state of the law in these countries as of end 2018.

On 24 and 25 July 2019, researchers and government officials came together at the German Finance Ministry to discuss issues relating to national and international tax policy. The researchers presented the latest results of their ongoing research projects.

At their meeting in Chantilly (France) on 17 and 18 July, the G7 finance ministers and central bank governors discussed the risks associated with stablecoins. They reiterated the importance of a fair international tax system and, for the first time, agreed on the introduction of a global minimum effective corporate tax as an explicit aim.

Distributed ledger technology (DLT) is an emerging basic technology of the digital age. In order to address the challenges raised by this technology, the Federal Ministry of Finance is helping to create a national regulatory framework for crypto tokens with the aim of unlocking the potential of DLT and at the same time preventing misuse.

The high-level working group proposed jointly in May by Germany, the Netherlands and France is now taking shape. On 12 June 2019, the first members of the high-level working group were announced. The group’s analysis and recommendations – which will flow into the CMU roadmap – are to be delivered no later than 30 September 2019.

Social inequality is a central subject in debates over economic and social policy. Along with inclusive growth, it has been on the G7 and G20 agenda for a number of years. In Germany, disposable income inequality is relatively low compared with other countries, even though the country performs less well when it comes to equality of wealth. The German government supports France’s initiative to make tackling inequality a key focus of its G7 presidency.

In an interview with The Nikkei, Japan’s leading business daily, Vice-Chancellor and Finance Minister Olaf Scholz discusses issues at the top of today’s fiscal policy agenda. In the run-up to the G20 meeting in Japan, he underlines how important it is for leaders to agree on an international system that ensures a minimum level of taxation. He also talks about current national projects such as the basic pension.

The German government created a Sustainable Finance Committee on 6 June 2019. The Committee’s purpose is to advise the German government as it drafts and implements a sustainable finance strategy, as well as to pool existing expertise and foster dialogue between the relevant players. The Committee is made up of representatives from business, civil society and academia, as well as representatives from a number of federal ministries.

The Retirement Income Act, which came into effect on 1 January 2005, changed the way pensions are taxed. As a result of these changes, more and more pensioners are liable to pay tax, even if they live outside Germany. In the past, dealing with pensioners living abroad posed special challenges for the revenue administration, not least due to language barriers.

Finance Minister Olaf Scholz has teamed up with Wopke Hoekstra and Bruno Le Maire, the finance ministers of the Netherlands and France, to launch an initiative to advance the Capital Markets Union, a step that will durably strengthen the EU internal market. The three finance ministers want to set up a high-level group of experts that will formulate specific milestones this year for the integration of European capital markets.

How have the European regulatory reforms adopted since the global financial crisis affected Germany’s financial sector? The Federal Ministry of Finance recently commissioned a report to find this out. The report, which was produced by the SAFE Research Center at Frankfurt University, found that the policy measures adopted at the European level are proving effective and are enhancing financial stability.

During a recent visit to Washington, D.C., State Secretary Wolfgang Schmidt confirmed German financial support for two thematic technical assistance funds at the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The funds help IMF member countries to improve their statistics systems and to make their financial markets more resilient against crises.

On 12 April 2019, Federal Minister of Finance Olaf Scholz gave a speech at the Peterson Institute for International Economics on "The Transatlantic Partnership: Common Values in a Changing World". He underlined the importance of a strong and stable European Union side by side with a powerful but principled United States of America.