German exports have expanded extremely strongly in recent years. On the National Accounts definition real exports have risen by an average of around 9 1/2 % since 2004. Over the same period Germany’s share of real world trade has risen from 8.8 % to 9.4 %, having slipped slightly at the beginning of the new millennium. The gains have been made even though exporters have been grappling with a persistently strong euro for some time now. In the last two years alone the euro rose by some 30 % against the dollar, pushing up the cost of German exports by the same percentage in purely arithmetical terms. This undermines the German economy’s price competitiveness. Against this backdrop, how can Germany’s success on the export front in recent years be explained?