Press Release No. 15/57

Press Release No.15/57
February 18, 2015

Germany has completed the requirements for adherence to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) Plus—the highest tier of the Data Standards Initiatives. Germany’s SDDS Plus data are now posted on the Dissemination Standards Bulletin Board at http://dsbb.imf.org/Pages/SDDS/Home.aspx?sp=y.

"Germany now meets the highest standard for the provision of economic and financial data, based on uniform specifications applying worldwide, thus making a major contribution to facilitating access to its vast range of macroeconomic data for users from all over the world", said the President of the Federal Statistical Office, Roderich Egeler. "The new data standard, SDDS Plus, provides important information regarding financial risks and international financial linkages. The publication of these statistics therefore closes significant information gaps exposed during the recent crisis and improves the basis for financial stability analysis," explains Professor Claudia Buch, Deputy President of the Deutsche Bundesbank. She is the member of the Bundesbank's Executive Board responsible for overseeing statistics and financial stability. "Essentially, by having internationally uniform requirements for publishing statistics, we are able to create an entirely new basis for comparison, particularly for countries with systemically important financial sectors."

Louis Marc Ducharme, Director of the IMF’s Statistics Department, welcomed Germany’s adherence and noted that “the dissemination of the new data sets under the SDDS Plus will be invaluable in fostering a deeper understanding and assessment of the performance of Germany’s financial sector, the cross-border-financial linkages, and the vulnerabilities of the economy to shocks.”

The SDDS Plus builds on the SDDS and its purpose is to assist statistically advanced countries with regard to the publication of comprehensive, timely, accessible, and reliable economic and financial data in an environment of continuing economic and financial integration.

The Data Standards Initiatives were established in the mid-1990s to enhance member countries’ data transparency and to promote the development of sound statistical systems. The need for data standards was highlighted by the financial crises of the mid-1990s and again in the late-2000s, when information deficiencies were seen to play a role. The Data Standards Initiatives also include the SDDS and the General Data Dissemination System (GDDS).

Detailed information on the Data Standards Initiatives can be found on the Dissemination Standards Bulletin Board at www.dsbb.imf.org. For more information on SDDS Plus and its worldwide launch see also the IMF’s press release of 18 November 2014.