The Bundesbank has set itself a medium-term strategic orientation with Strategy 2024, which the Bank’s Executive Board adopted in December 2020. “In a constantly changing environment, Strategy 2024 acts as a roadmap for the Bundesbank – the central bank of the largest economy in the euro area – both internally and externally,” said Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann. At other central banks and public institutions, too, strategic planning as a control tool has increasingly been used in recent years for target-based medium-term management.

Management staff from all quarters of the Bank were involved in developing the strategy, which ensured that the process was conducted transparently and openly and resulted in a strategy that enjoys broad support within the Bank. This is already the fifth medium-term strategy: the first was adopted by the German central bank in 2002, and was followed by further medium-term strategies in 2007, 2012 and 2016.

The Bundesbank mission statement developed for Strategy 2020 is being carried over to the new strategy cycle. Together with the Eurosystem’s mission statement, it forms the longer-term roadmap for the Bundesbank and articulates the future vision the Bundesbank aspires to over and beyond the strategic cycle, its defining features and how it interprets its role and mandate. It also serves to guide employees in their day-to-day conduct in the Bank.

The continuity of strategic planning is reflected in the fact that Strategy 2024 remains guided by the four universal strategic objectives for the Bank as a whole and the focus on the “we are one bank” mentality first devised for the 2020 cycle: as before, the Bundesbank wants to safeguard a culture of stability, strengthen its role in the European setting, enhance the Bank’s perceived profile, and make it fit for the future and efficient. The objectives for the Bank as a whole are fleshed out by 21 strategic objectives, through which the Bank seeks to address the challenges posed by the megatrends of digitalisation, demographic change, sustainability and the evolving international environment.

Implementation of the strategy is being closely overseen by the Bundesbank’s Directorate General Controlling, which reports to the Executive Board annually as part of a strategy review.