Jungholz is an enigma, one of those lovely geographical curiosities that we stumble upon from time to time around Europe. It is a fully paid-up part of the Austrian Tyrol, yet in many matters of everyday life it behaves as though it is in Germany. In the matter of postal services, it hedges its bets, enjoying both German and Austrian postal codes.

Prior to both Germany and Austria adopting the euro in January 2002, Jungholz did most of its business in German marks rather than using the Austrian schilling — and, particularly during the 1980s and 1990s, the village attracted large numbers of well-heeled cross-border investors from Germany who wanted to have a Deutschmarkdenominated account in a community protected by secrecy conventions which in those days were more a feature of Austrian banking than they are today.

In 1868, Jungholz entered into a customs agreement with the Kingdom of Bavaria, and in time became part of the German customs zone — even though it was not part of Germany (except for a seven-year period from 1938 when it was annexed by Nazi Germany and administered from Berlin).