Deutsche Bank Targets Asia in Drive to Diversify, Sewing Says

(Bloomberg) — Deutsche Bank AG Chief Executive Christian Sewing sees opportunities to grow in Asia and the Middle East, amid a lackluster economy in the German bank’s home market. 

“It’s not about decoupling from China. It’s all about diversifying,” Sewing said in an interview on Bloomberg TV Friday, adding that the bank’s clients were expanding in India and Southeast Asia. “That is clearly a growth market.” 

Germany’s largest lender has also invested heavily to grow in the Middle East, in wealth management but also investment banking, he said.

The Middle East and Southeast Asia are growing in importance for private banks since a prolonged property crisis in China and a collapse in capital-market transactions in Hong Kong dimmed prospects there. The strategy pits Deutsche Bank even more firmly against its biggest rival in private banking, UBS Group AG, which is targeting growth in many of the same regions under its global wealth head Iqbal Khan. 

Deutsche Bank plans to double the assets it manages for rich families in Southeast Asia and the Middle East over the next five years, tapping growing ties between ultra-rich clans in both regions, Bloomberg has reported.

Prosperous families in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are increasingly keen to invest in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, and vice versa, the lender’s global private banking head Claudio de Sanctis said previously.

 

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