Finance Monthly CFO Awards 2021

F i nance Month l y CFO Awards 2021 - GERMANY - - 14 - James, why did you join Deutsche Bank? Throughout my professional career, I have been passionate about helping to lead organisations through times of change. As Treasurer of Citigroup, for example, with responsibility for capital, funding and liquidity, I was able to support a fundamental restructuring of the organisation in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008-9. Coming to Deutsche Bank in 2017, I met a dynamic new management team committed to tackling the challenges facing the organisation. This culminated in the radical transformation programme which we launched in July of 2019 and are currently executing. Thisalsogavemeachance tocontribute my international experience at a leading European financial institution, the market leader in my native Germany. Deutsche Bank is Germany’s leading bank with strong European roots and a global network – the only German bank identified as a Global Systemically Important Bank (G-SIB) by the Financial Stability Board. Since its founding in 1870, Deutsche Bank has supported German industry both at home and across the globe. Acting as a trusted adviser and risk manager, Deutsche Bank has built relationships with corporate, institutional and private clients which have flourished over multiple generations. We’re building on this tradition and shaping this bank for the future – and that’s an exciting mission to be part of. What is the background for Deutsche Bank’s transformation strategy? In launching our transformation strategy, we set out to resolve several key challenges. We needed to improve profitability, reduce costs, instil greater discipline in capital allocation, reduce leverage, and at the same time sharpen our focus on building sustainable relationships with our most important clients. Our response to these challenges was the most fundamental restructuring of Deutsche Bank in the past two decades. We set ourselves an ambitious timeframe for execution: we aim to complete this transformation in three and a half years from our launch in mid-2019, so by the end of 2022. And what are the objectives of the transformation? We focused our transformation strategy on four fundamental goals: • To refocus Deutsche Bank around four client-centric core businesses, by exiting businesses making inadequate returns and sharpening our focus on key clients. These four businesses form a clearly-delineated ‘Core Bank’; • To restructure in order to become more efficient, particularly in our infrastructure – reducing operating costs by around €6 billion from 2018 levels while continuing to invest in technology, controls and growth opportunities; • To reinvigorate the bank’s traditional entrepreneurial spirit under the leadership of a new management team, with faster decision-making, disciplined execution and cultural change; • To free up capital by winding down assets committed to non-core activities, thereby helping Deutsche Bank self-fund transformation. This paves the way for us to return € 5 billion of capital to shareholders from 2022 onwards. To achieve this, we set up a dedicated Capital Release Unit, separate from the Core Bank, with clear targets for asset reduction. We also set ourselves clear financial targets for 2022. These included a post- tax Return on Tangible Equity of 8%, and above 9% in our Core Bank; a cost/ income ratio of 70% and maintaining a Common Equity Tier 1 (‘CET1’) capital ratio of at least 12.5% throughout the transformation process. What are your priorities in Deutsche Bank’s core businesses? We set ourselves clear objectives for each of the Core Bank’s four businesses: • We placed a new Corporate Bank at the heart of our business. We’re building on deep roots in our German home market to become the bank of choice for corporate treasurers in our key markets. We switched from a product-led to a client-led coverage model, and we’re growing our online digital offering; • We focused our Investment Bank around core strengths - businesses where we have leading positions, including financing, fixed income and debt capital markets. That includes exiting from Equities trading, resizing our core Rates platform and winding down non-strategic assets; In the first half of 2021, we generated the best first half-year profits since 2015, with all four core businesses contributing to year-on-year profit growth.