FRANKFURT, GERMANY - Summer is finally here! But not every multi-national financial institution is fit and ready for the beach, and one, Deutsche Bank, has decided that it’s time to trim some serious fat.
With a 150-year-old bloated corporate body, the bank has set ambitious goals to reduce its workforce by 20,000, or nearly 20%. “We’ve certainly had out fun in the past,” admits chief executive Christian Sewing, “but now it’s time really focus on our diet and well-being,” referring to stricter consumption of high-margin financing for the ultra-rich and cutting out global equities entirely.
Deutsche is no stranger to crash diets and transformations, yo-yoing like Jonah Hill in recent years, and its appetite for acquisitions has finally caught up to it. “The real wake-up call was the Fed’s stress test this June,” says Mr. Sewing, “we couldn’t even see the scale because our balance sheet was hanging over our belt so much; it was pretty shameful.”
Those watching Deutsche’s progress, both investors and tabloids, are hoping the bank will be able to break their binge-and-purge cycle, but fear that the current company they keep on Wall Street only enables their self-destructive habits.