MUNICH, May 23 (Reuters) – Germany’s best known economist Hans-Werner Sinn wanted to become a missionary as a teenager. His wife believes he is one.

The president of the influential Ifo think tank has been advocating for Greece’s exit from the euro zone in newspapers and talk shows for two years, convinced this is the only way for the debt-laden country to avoid economic disaster and for Germany to stop pouring money into a black hole.

Policymakers in Berlin do not act on all of his advice. But he has had huge influence on the tone of the euro zone crisis debate in the bloc’s biggest member and paymaster.

Sinn, whose name means “sense” in German, believes he has a duty to explain complex realities to voters in layman terms and lay out the best policies from an economic viewpoint, free from ideological bias.

“I am an economist by heart, I have a political mind and I want to improve the world,” he said in an interview in the neo-classical villa in Munich that houses Ifo.

“Over the years I have learned that you cannot talk to politicians and tell them what to do,” said Sinn, instantly recognizable by the silver Amish-like beard he grew as a student and that his wife insists he keeps.

“You have to talk to the voters. People need to learn, to access informed discourse about the crucial issues.”

BERLIN (Reuters) – Chancellor Angela Merkel fired her environment minister on Wednesday after he led her party to a regional election defeat, replacing him with a loyal conservative ally to push through her plans to take German energy into the post-nuclear era.

Norbert Roettgen, a Merkel protege once see as a possible successor, was removed after his campaign to be premier of the most populous German state, North Rhine-Westphalia, ended in a historic defeat for the Christian Democrats (CDU) on Sunday.

Merkel is expected to seek a third term as chancellor next year and appeared to be distancing herself from the NRW debacle by firing the 46-year-old minister, a rare move for her.

“The energy switch is a central task of this legislative period,” she said, referring to the accelerated conversion to renewable energy enforced by her U-turn on nuclear power last year in the aftermath of Japan’s Fukushima disaster.

Merkel nominated Peter Altmaier, parliamentary whip for her conservatives, to replace Roettgen, saying he would deliver a “new start”.

Altmaier is a canny operator in the Bundestag (lower house) who will be tasked with putting Merkel’s “Energiewende”, or energy switch, back on track after humiliating setbacks like the suspension of plans to slash tariffs to the solar industry in the upper house (Bundesrat) last week.

Germany’s main industry lobby, the BDI, immediately offered its support to the new minister, with BDI President Hans-Peter Keitel noting in a statement that the coming months would be “decisive” for the success of the energy switch.”

BERLIN/PARIS, May 16 (Reuters) – Investors snapped up French and German bonds at auctions on Wednesday, overlooking miserly yields as they sought out assets most likely to withstand the rising risk that Greece could leave the euro zone. The political situation in Athens, where anti-bailout momentum is gathering, has become so critical investors were prepared to accept returns that were the lowest ever offered on such debt, and not enough to compensate for expected inflation. Leftists opposed to the reforms agreed with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund under a vital aid deal are favourites to win new Greek elections in June after talks to form a government failed. That prospect has raised fears the country could default and quit the euro, sending shockwaves through markets, and pushing borrowing costs for larger indebted states in the bloc such as Spain and Italy rapidly towards unsustainable levels. “We’re hearing more and more talk about Greece leaving the euro zone, while this was a taboo subject a few months ago … The result of the auctions just shows you how nervous markets are,” said Viola Stork, fixed income analyst at Helaba Landesbank Hesse-Thueringen.

A German auction on Wednesday of 4.1 billion euros of its benchmark July 2022 Bund drew above-average demand of 1.5 times the amount sold and produced Germany’s lowest-ever cost of 10-year funds at an average 1.47 percent. The relative health of Germany’s economy and public finances mean its debt, rated triple-A by all three major credit rating agencies, is among the world’s safest and most liquid assets. The result contrasted with April’s debut sale of the same bond, when a record low coupon of 1.75 percent stopped Germany attracting enough bids to cover the full amount offered – an illustration of how much sentiment has deteriorated in a month. Meanwhile, demand at an auction of French five-year bonds, the country’s first sale of medium-term debt since Socialist Francois Hollande was elected president earlier this month, was nearly threefold the amount of debt on offer. France paid a record low cost of 1.72 percent as investors bid above-market prices to secure the bonds, which offer significantly higher returns than German, Dutch and other top-rated euro zone debt. France is still rated triple-A by Moody’s and Fitch, but was downgraded to AA+ by Standard & Poor’s in January as part of a mass downgrade of euro zone states. It also sold 1.182 billion euros of bonds linked to French and euro zone inflation rates in a separate auction with investors making bids worth 3.467 billion euros, also nearly three times the amount on offer. Some analysts saw the strong auction result as a sign that markets were encouraged by the outcome of Tuesday’s meeting between Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, at which they pledged to forge a joint approach in policy. Instead of renegotiating the Merkel-backed European agreement on budget discipline as some investors had feared before the election, they are now expected to complement it with a “growth pact”.

BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT French 10-year yields have fallen about 30 basis points to 2.86 percent from levels hit in late April when markets fretted about Hollande’s anti-austerity rhetoric and were one percentage point lower than at the height of the crisis in November. “The diplomatic language coming from the meeting with Merkel was relatively reassuring and for the time being Hollande is being given the benefit of the doubt,” Investec fixed income analyst Elisabeth Afseth said. She added, however, that if he went ahead with his pre-election promises to reverse some of the austerity steps taken by his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy, investors would start selling French bonds. Dealers said the main factor driving demand at Wednesday’s auction, which came as worries about Greece prompted investors to dump riskier assets worldwide, was the relatively higher premium that French bonds offer compared with German debt. Previously-issued French five-year debt trading in secondary markets was yielding 1.75 percent on Wednesday, 120 basis points more than its German equivalent and 30 bps more compared with German 10-year Bunds. Other governments whose debt is perceived to offer shelter from storms in the euro zone have also seen their borrowing costs tumble in recent weeks, among them Britain, Japan, the United States and some Scandinavian countries. “Germany trades at very expensive levels and France is one of the alternatives now that the election is out of the way,” Lloyds rate strategist Achilleas Georgolopoulos said.

(Additional reporting by government bonds desk in London; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Graphic by Scott Barber; Editing by Catherine Evans)

NEUMUENSTER, Germany, April 29 (Reuters) – With some sporting pirate garb and black beards in light-hearted tribute to their name, Germany’s Pirates party gathered in a small city hall and in the vast open waters of cyberspace this weekend to chart a course that may yet take them to the national parliament.

The party, which met in the northern city of Neumuenster, aroused a mixture of rye amusement and angry derision when it stormed onto the political scene last year garnering 8.9 percent of vote in Berlin’s city assembly. Since then, however, it has staked a claim to third place in the party pecking order, garnering 11 to 13 percent in opinion polls.

Even Chancellor Angela Merkel, not one to indulge the frivolous, must take them seriously. Her chances of winning a third term at 2013 federal polls are rising because the Pirates’ surge from nowhere makes it less likely that the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) and Greens can form a majority.

The Pirates are drawing support from all parties, but particularly from the left. Thanks to their spirited anti-establishment attitude they are also attracting many new voters who in the past stayed away from the polls on election day.

“We were young and we were small, but we have already made history,” said 24-year old Marina Weisband, a Pirates leader, in a speech opening a two-day congress where suits were few and far between but bottles of high caffeine soft drinks and bags of sweets littered the tables.

“We believe that people have to be connected because the best ideas stem from a network,” she added.

Critics, especially in mainstream parties, portray them as a chaotic assembly of individuals with few policies beyond a vague infatuation with the internet. Talk of extremism and irresponsibility recalls denunciations of the Greens in the 1980s during their breathtaking advance on the Bundestag.

NEUMUENSTER, Germany (Reuters) – With some sporting pirate garb and black beards in light-hearted tribute to their name, Germany’s Pirates party gathered in a small city hall and in the vast open waters of cyberspace this weekend to chart a course that may yet take them to the national parliament.

The party, which met in the northern city of Neumuenster, aroused a mixture of rye amusement and angry derision when it stormed onto the political scene last year garnering 8.9 percent of vote in Berlin’s city assembly. Since then, however, it has staked a claim to third place in the party pecking order, garnering 11 to 13 percent in opinion polls.

Even Chancellor Angela Merkel, not one to indulge the frivolous, must take them seriously. Her chances of winning a third term at 2013 federal polls are rising because the Pirates’ surge from nowhere makes it less likely that the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) and Greens can form a majority.

The Pirates are drawing support from all parties, but particularly from the left. Thanks to their spirited anti-establishment attitude they are also attracting many new voters who in the past stayed away from the polls on election day.

“We were young and we were small, but we have already made history,” said 24-year old Marina Weisband, a Pirates leader, in a speech opening a two-day congress where suits were few and far between but bottles of high caffeine soft drinks and bags of sweets littered the tables.

“We believe that people have to be connected because the best ideas stem from a network,” she added.

Critics, especially in mainstream parties, portray them as a chaotic assembly of individuals with few policies beyond a vague infatuation with the internet. Talk of extremism and irresponsibility recalls denunciations of the Greens in the 1980s during their breathtaking advance on the Bundestag.

BERLIN (Reuters) – Enter the soaring exhibition hall of Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof and you feel as if you are faced with an eerie science-fiction film set.

Colossal cones of light pierce the misty, darkness, beckoning the visitor to tread within their silvery forms, in this new exhibition of British-born artist Anthony McCall’s so-called “light films”.

The temptation is to lose oneself.

“Many people tell me they thought they were looking for just 15 minutes, but when they came out they discovered they had been there for an hour,” said McCall. “The quiet here seems to slow everything down, it is contemplative, I suppose.”

“Five Minutes of Pure Sculpture” is the first major German exhibition of the work of McCall, who has also been commissioned to create a giant column of light visible for 100 km in northwestern England for the Olympic Games.

The exhibition showcases both his vertical and horizontal light films, slowly moving lines in white on black projected into a space filled with a fine haze.

These lines become slowly moving two-dimensional drawings on the wall or floor of lines but become seemingly tangible solid light structures in space.

KARLSRUHE, Germany (Reuters) – Poll figures may be low and forecasts gloomy, but Martina Reuter felt certain things were looking up for her party – Germany’s Free Democrats (FDP), the junior partner in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s centre-right coalition.

“At the moment there is a real mood of change … There is a return to the old, fundamental values,” the 50-year-old party member told Reuters at a weekend FDP congress in Karlsruhe, western Germany.

Her comments were in tune with the atmosphere of determined bonhomie among the hundreds of delegates at the gathering.

But they clashed with the latest data – an opinion poll published on Sunday confirmed other forecasts that the FDP would fail to reach the 5 percent threshold needed to enter parliament if a national election scheduled for 2013 were held today.

It is far from certain the pro-business party, which has spent 44 of the last 64 years in government, will muster enough votes to stay in two regional assemblies in May elections.

The FDP’s woes are also a headache for Merkel because they could distract her coalition from its main task of tackling the euro zone crisis. Merkel will also need a new coalition partner if the FDP is ejected from the Bundestag lower house next year.

At the conference, the party’s mostly young leaders circulated, cracking jokes, slapping backs and greeting supporters by their first names and using the familiar pronoun ‘du’.

BERLIN, April 20 (Reuters) – German business sentiment unexpectedly rose for the sixth month in a row in April in a sign that Europe’s largest economy continues to outpace peers and shrug off persistent worries about the euro zone debt crisis.

The Munich-based Ifo think tank said on Friday its business climate index, based on a monthly survey of some 7,000 companies, inched up to 109.9 in April from 109.8 in March, taking it to its highest level since July 2011.

Economists polled by Reuters had been expecting a slight fall to 109.5.

“The impact of the latest wave of the euro crisis on German business confidence remains small,” said Christian Schulz of Berenberg Bank. “The fundamental strength of the economy continues to outweigh external worries.”

The euro pushed up to a session high against the dollar and German bond futures erased gains on the numbers, which came days after another closely-watched German sentiment gauge from the Mannheim-based ZEW institute pushed to it highest level in nearly two years.

Europe’s 2-1/2 year old debt crisis appeared to be easing in the first few months of 2012, but worries about the finances of big economies like Spain and Italy have unsettled markets in recent weeks.

The waning impact of the European Central Bank’s massive liquidity injections has refocused investor attention on banking sector weakness and the difficulties in pushing through reforms in southern Europe, where some economies are mired in deep recessions.

BERLIN, April 19 (Reuters) – Hundreds of birch trees from the biggest Nazi death camp, at Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland, are dotted around Berlin as a living memorial of this dark chapter in Germany’s past.

The trees, called Birke in German, lent their name to the Birkenau camp where as many as 1.5 million people, mostly Jews, perished between 1940 and 1945.

The installation “Berlin-Birkenau” by Polish artist Lukasz Surowiec, 26, is part of the Berlin Biennale, a contemporary arts festival devoted this year to political art.

“This is an attempt to create a new kind of monument – a living monument,” said Surowiec, who has had commemorative plaques erected in front of the trees. “With the help of nature, I try to continue a generational mission of deepening the memory of the victims of the Holocaust.

“My project is effectively based on giving back the ‘inheritance’ [of the camps] to its owners.”

Biennale director Artur Zmijewski, also Polish, says it seems paradoxical to his compatriots that a place where Germans committed one of the worst crimes against humanity is not in Germany, but in Poland.

This installation, one of many at the Biennale which is not confined to a gallery or museum, is therefore partly about the “politics of history”, he said.

LONDON/BERLIN, April 11 (Reuters) – Safe-haven Germany offered the lowest ever return of 1.75 percent on its 10-year government bonds on Wednesday, dampening demand for its debt despite concerns about Spain and Italy.

Investors sold Spanish debt on Tuesday and yields jumped at an Italian bill auction on Wednesday, on doubts about whether those countries can keep debt and deficits in check. This had drawn attention to the auction of Germany’s low risk debt.

As was the case at the height of the euro zone debt crisis in November last year, the low yields in Germany led to fewer bids than the amount on offer, a phenomenon which debt experts term as a technically uncovered auction.

The new 10-year Bund offered a record low coupon of 1.75 percent and the average yield at auction was 1.77 percent, also an all-time low.

“The market looks to have got a nosebleed at these levels,” Credit Agricole rate strategist Peter Chatwell said.

The debt agency said the result of the sale was “good” and that it was in line with its plans, even though Germany kept around 23 percent of the full amount on its books, higher than this year’s average.

Germany usually holds back a portion of the amount on offer at debt sales, which it uses for market smoothing operations. A large retention rate can be a sign of faltering investor demand, analysts say.