Business Week: Why resistance to hostile takeovers means Germany risks missing out on the restructuring it needs

A Weekly Digest of The World's Financial Press

A SINGLE shareholder frequently holds a majority stake in German companies. Interlocking holdings among banks and insurers is further defence against unwanted intrusion.

It's time for German authorities to give companies more freedom to duke it out until the best wins.

Schroder, now Chancellor, could temporarily cut the 50-per-cent-plus capital-gains tax to prod banks to sell industrial stakes. The take-over code needs to be made mandatory too. German execs know they have to toughen up. Their government should give them a nudge in the right direction.