The winnowing and consolidation of Deutsche Bank’s operations has finally seen a cessation today, after the group announced that it is hiring a tranche of new personnel, numbered at 100 strong in a bid to boost its Equities trading operations.
The move follows a series of announcements radiating from the lender that largely portended a shift in its strategic focus, personnel, and overall asset management and bond trading capabilities, long the cornerstone of its global business. During the end of 2015, Deutsche Bank unveiled a widespread initiative that justified upwards of 34,000 job cuts.
The departure from this narrative comes at a good time for the bank, namely as it looks to salvage diving share prices for investors. Waning profit margins are hardly an issue shared solely by Deutsche Bank, as rivals such as Credit Suisse, Barclays, and Standard Chartered have all been forced to recalibrate their business due to myriad quarterly losses and worried shareholders. As recently as December, Deutsche Bank still had over 101,000 employees across its global business.
As such, Deutsche Bank’s move constitutes an attempt to help improve its overall profitability given the shift to less capital-intensive areas such as equity trading. The new hires will be spread across the US, Europe, and Asia, allocated across several product groups – overall however the emphasis and focus on the hires will remain on technology and electronic trading capabilities at the lender.
Moreover, Deutsche Bank has also opted to bolster its prime finance department, as it looks to provide a beacon for hedge funds. It is unclear at this juncture what sort of efforts are underway in terms of incoming personnel in this space, as the initial hiring tranche appears to be relegated mostly to the equities realm.
