Deutsche Bank vows more wealth management hires to reverse flows

[FRANKFURT] Deutsche Bank AG's new European wealth management head, Claudio de Sanctis, slashed the number of regional managers and announced aggressive hiring plans in a bid to jump-start revenues and flows at the unit.

As part of the reorganization, the German lender hired Marco Pagliara from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. He will oversee northern and eastern Europe as one of six market heads, down from 14 previously.

"We want to build the preeminent pan-European wealth manager and we're hiring from our main competitors to achieve that," Mr de Sanctis said in a phone interview.

Mr De Sanctis was hired last year from Credit Suisse Group AG to run the European unit of a division headed by Fabrizio Campelli. With 199 billion euros (S$305.6 billion) overseen for clients, Deutsche Bank's wealth management is small compared with rivals such as Credit Suisse and UBS Group AG, but its one area where Chief Executive Officer Christian Sewing wants to expand as he cuts back the securities unit.

"We want to grow the asset flow in Europe and boost profitability," Mr Campelli said in a phone interview. "The plan is to get more boots on the ground."

Even with more relationship managers, winning clients won't be easy. UBS's Chief Executive Officer Sergio Ermotti said yesterday that wealth management revenue at the world's largest private bank is down about 9 per cent this quarter from a year ago as clients stayed on the sidelines.

At Deutsche Bank, wealth management clients pulled a net 4.4 billion euros last year, amid market turmoil in the final months and images of a police raid on the lender's Frankfurt headquarters.

The unit "had a decent start" in the first quarter, Mr Campelli said, despite "a very difficult market environment."

The new market heads appointed for the European wealth management operations also include Anke Sahlen, Frank Schriever, Stephan Jugenheimer, Roberto Parazzini and Daniel Kalczynski. The bank also hired Alessandro Caironi from Credit Suisse as head investment manager.

BLOOMBERG

BT is now on Telegram!

For daily updates on weekdays and specially selected content for the weekend. Subscribe to t.me/BizTimes