With 82 million people, Germany has the largest population of any country in western Europe and also the largest economy. Annual GDP figures are around US$3.5 trillion, making Germany the fourth largest economy in the world. Germany’s political system operates as a democratic, federal parliamentary republic and Angela Merkel has been the Chancellor since 2005.

Turkish migrants make up the largest minority ethnic group (~15.0%) in Germany, followed Poles (8%) and Syrians (~6.5%). In 2015 alone one million new migrants settled in Germany.

The official currency of Germany is the euro. 19 countries in the EU use the euro, making the level of the currency inextricably tied to the overall economic health of these nations. For example, in 2016 whilst the German economy was strong, the level of the euro fell sharply because sovereign debt risks in a few other EU countries increased. With direction of the EUR/AUD exchange rate is heavily influenced by the interest rate differentials between the European Central Bank and the Reserve Bank of Australia.

To send money to Germany you’ll need the name on the recipient’s bank account, the IBAN number and the SWIFT/BIC Code. The length of a German IBAN is always 22 characters and includes the BLZ code, which is an 8-digit number that pinpoints the individual bank branch within Germany where you want to send money.

In most cases, FlashFX sends euros to Germany via a SEPA transfer. SEPA (or the Single Euro Payments Area) is the new format for cross-border Euro bank transfers. Its aim is to make euro-denominated transactions in the SEPA area no different to domestic payments in terms of cost and speed. SEPA is similar to PayID in Australia.