The German bank Deutsche Bank He announced that he will cut 50 million euros in costs in the IT sector of his retail banking sector starting from 2026. A new cut, after that of the 2,000 private banking employees announced for 2025, which should compensate the lack of savings due to the complex integration of the IT systems of the postbank subsidiary.
That of Postbank It turned out to be a much more complex affair than Deutsche. The acquisition, which took place in 2010, brought 12 million customers, but a problematic integration with the systems of the German giant led to the imposition of a special supervisor on the operation and also to a fine.
Deutsche Bank’s new cuts
Claudio De SanctisHead of the Private Bank sector of Deutsche, the one in contact with the private account holders, said, in an interview with the Financial Times, that the German giant is ready for another 50 million cuts at the costs starting from 2026. A promise made to the investors, after Deutsche has failed the savings objectives scheduled for 2025.
Of the 300 million euros of expenses per year less promised, the German giant managed to obtain only 270 million. De Sanctis’s promise is to compensate for this delay next year, touching 320 million euros in expenses, especially in the IT infrastructure.
The problem that caused this delay would derive from the complex integration of postbank systems, a company acquired in 2010 by Deutsche Bank and with more than 12 million customers, in those of the large German bank. A problem that has been dragging for years now.
The postbank problem
It is not the first time that Postbank’s computer systems create serious Deutsche Bank problems. The transition should have ended in 2022, but was postponed by 3 years due to the various incompatibility between the IT infrastructure of the two banks. In 2023 the first attempt to migrate data from Postbank databases to those of Deutsche caused disservices for months to thousands of bank customers.
The situation thus became critical that he was forced to intervene the Bafinthe German financial surveillance authority, which appointed a supervisor for the entire operation and influenced a fine to Deutsche Bank.
The improvement of the retail sector
The retail It is just under a third of Deutsche’s activities in terms of turnover, but produces only 23% of profits. For this reason, the German bank has embarked on a large project of expenses. The goal was to move from a cost/revenue ratio of 81% to a 65% by 2025. At the moment, this index is 71%, good, but higher than the group average, which stands at 61%.
However, De Sanctis has also announced new hires as part of the Wealth Management, 200 people in the next two years. A reflection of the optimism of the German bank, which also raised its expectations for one of the main indexes of the American stock exchange, the S&P 500, bringing them from 6,150 points to 6,550.
