Germany Economy Minister Reiche warned that rising support for the far-right AfD could undermine the government’s efforts to attract foreign investors, as it seeks at least EUR 3.75tln in private capital by 2040, according to FT

Ministerial warnings that domestic political risk deters foreign capital are a recurring feature of European economies with large external financing needs, and they tend to matter less for the remark itself than for what it signals about the governing coalition's anxiety over its investment agenda. Germany's case is specific: successive governments have framed large private capital mobilisation targets as central to infrastructure and energy transition funding, and anything that raises the perceived probability of a populist party entering government feeds directly into the political risk premium embedded in long-dated project finance and cross-border direct investment decisions. The transmission channel runs through policy continuity expectations rather than Bund spreads in the first instance; foreign direct investment committees and infrastructure funds reprice commitment risk well before rates markets do. Episodes of this kind have historically been self-reinforcing when coalition arithmetic looks fragile and self-correcting when the centrist majority appears secure, so the tells are polling trajectories, any shift in coalition dynamics ahead of elections, and whether business lobbies or foreign chambers echo the minister's framing. The EUR 3.75tln figure is a stated target rather than committed capital, which is itself the point: mobilisation targets of this scale are credibly achieved only under stable policy expectations. As a minister's opinion rather than a policy event, the note is directional.