The year 1999 saw Germany join European monetary union, and since then the Bundesbank has been committed to a stable euro with equal vigour. The Bundesbank first saw the light of the world on 4 July 1957, the day on which Germany’s Bundestag adopted the Bundesbank Act – alongside the Antitrust Act.
Writing at the time, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper remarked that this day had witnessed “the adoption of two crucially important pieces of basic legislation for our entire economic system". When the Bundesbank Act came into force on 1 August 1957, the Bank deutscher Länder, the Land Central Banks and the Berlin Central Bank were merged to form a single institution, the Deutsche Bundesbank.