TARGET2 is an interbank payment system for the real-time processing of cross-border transfers throughout the European Union. TARGET (Trans-European Automated Real-time Gross Settlement Express Transfer System) was replaced in November 2007 by TARGET2.

TARGET2 is the real-time gross settlement (RTGS) system owned and operated by the Eurosystem. TARGET2 is the second generation of TARGET. Payment transactions are settled one by one on a continuous basis in central bank money with immediate finality. There is no upper or lower limit on the value of payments. TARGET2 mainly settles operations of monetary policy and money market operations. TARGET2 has to be used for all payments involving the Eurosystem, as well as for the settlement of operations of all large-value net settlement systems and securities settlement systems handling the euro. TARGET2 is operated on a single technical platform. The business relationships are established between the TARGET2 users and their National Central Bank. In terms of the value processed, TARGET2 is one of the largest payment systems in the world.

Dirk Müller (born 18 November 1975 in Burbach) is a German race driver, driving for BMW Team RLL in the 2012 American Le Mans Series. His former Schnitzer BMW team-mate Jörg Müller is unrelated, as is French driver Yvan Muller.

In 1996, Dirk Müller won a Formula 3 race at the Nürburgring. In 1998, after a win in the GT1 class of the 24 Hours of Daytona, he scored his first title, the German Porsche Cup, to be followed by the ALMS GT title in 2000.

From the 2002 to 2005 season, both Dirk and Jörg were driving BMW 3series model E46 touring cars for the Schnitzer-operated works squad Team Deutschland in the FIA European Touring Car Championship (now WTCC). Since 2006, the team uses the new BMW 3series model E90 which is based on the BMW 320si limited edition model that has a 4-cyl engine rather than the usual 6-cyl.

The 2004 24 Hours Nürburgring was won by both Müllers (and Hans-Joachim Stuck) with the BMW M3 GTR V8 that had been raced successfully in the 2001 ALMS. In 2005, the Müllers finished 2nd behind their sister car.

Hans-Werner Sinn (born March 7, 1948) is a German economist and President of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research.

After studying economics at the University of Münster from 1967 to 1972 and receiving his doctorate from the University of Mannheim in 1978, Sinn was awarded the venia legendi in 1983, also from the University of Mannheim.

Since 1984 Sinn has been full professor in the faculty of economics at the University of Munich (LMU), first holding the chair for economics and insurance, and from 1994 the chair for economics and public finance. During leaves of absence from Mannheim and Munich he held visiting professorships (1978/79 and 1984/85) at the University of Western Ontario in Canada. During sabbaticals he was also visiting researcher at the London School of Economics, as well as at Bergen, Stanford, Princeton and Jerusalem Universities. Since 1988 he has been honorary professor of the University of Vienna, where he has held many lectures. Since 1 February 1999 Sinn has been president of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research. In 2006 he became president of the International Institute of Public Finance. From 1997 to 2000 Sinn headed the Verein für Socialpolitik, the association of German-speaking economists.

Hans Werner Henze (born 1 July 1926, Gütersloh, Westphalia) is a German composer of prodigious output best known for "his consistent cultivation of music for the theatre throughout his life". His music is extremely varied in style, having been influenced by serialism, atonality, Stravinsky, Italian music, Arabic music and jazz, as well as traditional schools of German composition.

Henze is also known for his political convictions. He left Germany for Italy in 1953 because of a perceived intolerance towards his leftist politics and homosexuality. He lives in the village of Marino in the central Italian region of Lazio, and still travels extensively, in particular to Britain and Germany, as part of his work. An avowed Marxist and member of the Communist Party of Italy, Henze has produced compositions honoring Ho Chi Minh and Che Guevara. The librettist of his requiem for Che Guevara, titled Das Floß der Medusa (The Raft of Medusa), was among several people arrested at the 1968 Hamburg premiere in the riot that followed the placing of a red flag on the stage. Henze spent a year teaching in Cuba, though he later became disillusioned with Castro.

Jens Weidmann (born 20 April 1968 in Solingen) is a German economist and president of the Deutsche Bundesbank. Before assuming the top Bundesbank position in 2011, from February 2006, he served as Head of Division IV (Economic and Financial Policy) in the Federal Chancellery. He was the chief negotiator of the Federal Republic of Germany for both the summits of the G8 and the G20.

In 1987 Weidmann graduated from gymnasium in Backnang, Baden-Württemberg after which he studied economics at Université Paul Cézanne Aix-Marseille III, the University of Paris, and University of Bonn. He received his doctoral degree under the auspices of monetary theorist Manfred J. M. Neumann. During his studies Weidmann had internships at the Banque de France and the National Bank of Rwanda. Due to the resulting knowledge of the French financing sector his later career in German financial politics was welcomed in France and seen as a support of the Franco-German twin engine.

From 1997 to 1999 Weidmann worked at the International Monetary Fund. Until 2004 he worked as Secretary of the German Council of Economic Experts. From there he moved to the Bundesbank, where he was until 2006 the head of the Monetary Policy and Monetary Analysis group. Since 2006 he was responsible for preparing the content and strategy of the G-20 round which was formed to counter the effects of the financial crisis. Chancellor Angela Merkel promoted him in December 2009 to the influential role of the Sherpa of the G8 summits as she considers the G8 round to be only a pre-summit of the G20 round in the field of the world-wide financial system as well as that most other subjects need a wider context than the G8 as well (compare Heiligendamm Process for G8+5).