Berlin can hardly escape the pressure of the allies

Good morning dear readers,

The events remind him a little of the US film comedy “Groundhog Day”, says Handelsblatt aviation reporter Jens Koenen: For days Italian newspapers have been reporting again that Lufthansa is about to invest in ITA, the successor company to the insolvent Alitalia.

This prognosis has been made time and again in recent years – so far it has never been fulfilled. It seems different this time.

A decree passed by the Italian government just before Christmas is tailored between the lines to a single desired buyer for ITA: Lufthansa. With the acquisition in Italy, Lufthansa boss Jens Spohr could further expand his group’s role as the largest airline group in Europe.

In addition, analyzes colleague Koenen, ITA would bring the urgently needed transfer hub in southern Europe to the Lufthansa Group in Rome in order to be competitive on new routes, for example towards Africa.

For the same reason, Spohr said recently at an internal Lufthansa event, you should also look at the Portuguese TAP. The government in Lisbon also wants to privatize the airline.

The Belgian government and the energy company Engie have agreed to extend the service lives of the two nuclear power plants Tihange 3 and Doel 4 to 2035. The extension is crucial to ensure security of energy supply over the next ten years, said Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo on Monday evening. In Germany, the Belgian nuclear reactors repeatedly cause discussions. Defects were found several times, such as dilapidated concrete parts.

However, it is quite possible that the last three nuclear power plants in Germany will go offline as planned this spring and that we will then be happy to be able to import nuclear power from the Belgian Brösel reactors instead.

Handelsblatt energy expert Klaus Stratmann has traced the extent to which we are already dependent on such imports on the basis of December 16, 2022:

• According to data from the Federal Network Agency, the contribution of wind and sun to covering electricity demand that afternoon was less than two gigawatts (GW).
• In addition, there were another two GW from biomass and hydropower.
• However, demand for electricity ranged between 60 and 70 GW.
• In other words, by far the largest share of demand had to be covered by coal, gas and nuclear power plants.
• In addition, at times more than five GW of net electricity imports were required to meet demand. That is more than the almost four GW of nuclear power currently still on the grid.

For Christof Bauer, energy expert at TU Darmstadt, these figures are an alarm signal: for the first time we have seen from a specific event that Germany is already dependent on reliable supplies from abroad.

But, according to Bauer, it is by no means certain that other countries can always help out.

Apparently, German politicians knowingly accept this risk in terms of energy supply. For my colleague Stratmann, this fulfills the criteria of “organized irresponsibility”.

It is the last major taboo on arms supplies to Ukraine: no western-made main battle tanks. The unserved among us have had to learn step by step over the past few months that although all kinds of military equipment falls into the category of tanks (armored howitzers, anti-aircraft tanks, armored personnel carriers, reconnaissance tanks), it still does not qualify as a main battle tank.

Luckily, years ago I curiously followed the brown sign on the A7 to the “German Tank Museum” in the Lüneburg Heath, otherwise I probably wouldn’t have been able to follow the debate months ago.

Now the last taboo seems to be falling: according to reports from various media, Great Britain is considering supplying up to ten Challenger 2 battle tanks to Ukraine. According to “Spiegel”, the official decision will be made at the meeting of the so-called “Ramstein Group” of western Ukraine allies on January 20. At the same time, the Polish government is aiming for a broad coalition of several countries to hand over western main battle tanks such as the Leopard 2.

Government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit made it clear yesterday that there is no change of course in Germany when it comes to battle tanks: “The federal government has no intention at the moment to deliver Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine.”

The crucial part of the sentence should read: “at the present time”.

After all, if other Western allies come forward, the German government will once again be unable to evade peer pressure.

The German stock market had the best start to the year since 2003. However, the prospects for the entire market are uncertain. In order to provide orientation, the Handelsblatt has evaluated more than 2000 assessments by analysts for all 160 stocks in the Dax, MDax and SDax and, on this basis, created a ranking with the “top picks” of the experts for the year 2023.

Among the stocks most recommended are blue chips such as Deutsche Telekom and Infineon, but also surprising names such as IT service provider Adesso and fiber optics specialist Adtran.

Note: An analyst can be wrong. With 2000 analyst votes that is at least less likely.

Due to heavy rains in California, all residents have to evacuate the city of Montecito. The local authorities ordered this on Monday evening. The residents of the celebrity cluster also include Prince Harry and his wife Meghan. But it would probably mean overestimating the meteorological influence of the late Queen Elizabeth II. If one were to assume that the precipitation was a call to order from the afterlife to the unruly grandson.

He would have deserved it. Harry’s autobiographical book of accounts with the British royal family is released worldwide today. If you don’t feel the need to read the work after the prince’s countless tearful preliminary interviews and the circulated text passages about Harry’s first sex behind the pub: Then you feel like me.

I wish you a day as full as a prince’s roll.

Best regards

your

Christian Rickens

Editor-in-Chief Handelsblatt

PS: Crisis management was the order of the day last year. Now the Social Democrats, Greens and Liberals are discussing the right course for 2023 at their annual meeting. What can the SPD, Greens and FDP still achieve together? What issues should they tackle next? What has gone well so far, where have mistakes been made? Write us your opinion in five sentences on [email protected]. We will publish selected contributions with attribution on Thursday.