Business sector Financial markets in 2019

KfW Group bundles its long and short-term funding activities and its liquidity, currency, interest rate and asset management for the entire group in the business sector Financial markets. KfW funds its business activities almost completely in the international money and capital markets and is one of the world's most active and largest bond issuers.

Its reputation is based on its responsible behaviour and on the Federal Republic of Germany's explicit and direct guarantee (section 1a of the “Law Concerning KfW”: Federal Republic of Germany’s liability), which is reflected in high credit quality and forms the basis of an excellent financial rating. Excellent sustainability ratings result from KfW's positioning as one of the leading sustainable promotional banks.

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In order to fund its promotional business, KfW raised funds of EUR 80.6 billion on the international capital markets in 2019. A total of 157 bonds were issued in 12 currencies.

The green bond programme was expanded and more firmly incorporated into the overall strategy in 2019; it now forms one of the four pillars of KfW’s funding. KfW’s green bonds have enabled investors to combine the security and liquidity typical of KfW bonds with promotion of environmental and climate protection in a targeted manner since 2014.

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KfW ensures the liquidity of the entire group via the global money and capital markets. KfW is one of the world's most active players in the money market, particularly through its commercial paper programmes, which serve short-term borrowing and are important for liquidity management for the entire group.

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The Financial markets business sector invested a total of around EUR 1.4 billion in the promotional business via the capital markets in 2019. Around EUR 1.1 billion of this total was used in securitisation transactions to promote SMEs. KfW supported climate change mitigation and environmental protection by investing EUR 0.3 billion in green bonds.

KfW's holding in Deutsche Telekom AG remained unchanged at around 829.2 million shares over the course of 2019. This corresponded to 17.4% of the share capital of Deutsche Telekom AG as of 31 December 2019 (Federal Government 14.5% and free float 68.1%).

KfW's holding in Deutsche Post AG remained unchanged at 253.9 million shares over the course of 2019. This corresponded to around 20.5% of the share capital of Deutsche Post AG as of 31 December 2019 (free float 79.5%).

Legal notice:
The information contained in this online Annual Report 2019 is based on KfW’s Financial Report 2019, which you can download here. Should this online Annual Report 2019, despite the great care taken in preparation of its content, contain any contradictions or errors compared to the Financial Report, the KfW Financial Report 2019 takes priority.