Deutsche Bank AG is poised to win back market share it lost to U.S. rivals as the German lender completes internal restructuring plans, according to the head of its corporate and investment bank in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
“The American banks have taken share from us,” said Alasdair Warren in an interview on Bloomberg TV Monday. “Through the latter part of last year and the early part of this we were frankly quite distracted by a bunch of internal related issues.”
As 2016 draws to a close though, Warren is confident that Deutsche Bank can gain back some lost ground.
“Over the course of the last six months we’ve seen that flatten,” he said. “I think we’re going to see it pick up again.”
“A lot of international and European clients want to continue to work with us.”
Deutsche Bank is ranked No.9 for advising on M&A deals in Europe this year, working on 43 deals valued at about $101 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. At the same point in 2015, the German lender was ranked at No.7, and finished the year in sixth position.
The bank’s chief executive officer, John Cryan, has said the lender may fail to be profitable this year after posting the first annual loss since 2008 last year. With plans to eliminate thousands of jobs and cut risky assets, he has called 2016 a peak restructuring year. Deutsche Bank is also currently negotiating a multi-billion-dollar settlement with the U.S. Justice Department to resolve a years-long investigation into its mortgage-bond dealings.
Brexit Deals
Since U.K. voters opted to leave the European Union in a referendum vote in June, there’s been a drop in U.K. companies seeking acquisitions abroad and doing deals with each other, Warren said. Overall though, deal volumes have picked up since the decision after a slow start to the year -- and inbound activity into the U.K. is booming, he said.
“Whilst they’ve been down quite significantly in the first half of the year, pre the Brexit vote, actually we’ve seen quite a pickup in activity post that,” Warren said. “We’ve seen some very specific trends develop.”
Warren joined Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank last year from Goldman Sachs Group Inc., where he was co-head of the financial sponsors group. The bank advised Anheuser-Busch InBev NV on its $103 billion takeover of SABMiller Plc, which was given the go ahead by shareholders of the London-based brewer on Sept. 28.
To contact the reporters on this story: Ruth David in London at rdavid9@bloomberg.net, Jeffrey McCracken in New York at jmccracken3@bloomberg.net, Elizabeth Fournier in London at efournier5@bloomberg.net. To contact the editors responsible for this story: Aaron Kirchfeld at akirchfeld@bloomberg.net, Elizabeth Fournier
©2016 Bloomberg L.P.
