The 48-year-old has a good laugh: On Friday, the Deutsche Bank Supervisory Board promoted him to one of two deputies to CEO Christian Sewing.
(Photo: Bloomberg)
Frankfurt Three years ago, CFO James von Moltke was still considered by some to be a shaky candidate on the Deutsche Bank board. The 52-year-old is now finally rid of this reputation: the supervisory board of the largest German bank promoted the manager to deputy CEO on Friday evening.
Von Moltke will take on the new position immediately alongside his role as Chief Financial Officer. He shares this role with private customer manager Karl von Rohr, who has been deputy bank manager Christian Sewing since 2018.
With this step, the Supervisory Board is honoring the progress made in restructuring the bank. Deutsche Bank recently confirmed its return and efficiency targets for 2022 at an investor day. “James von Moltke has done an outstanding job as Chief Financial Officer over the past five years and has played an important role in the successful transformation of Deutsche Bank,” said Paul Achleitner, Chairman of the Supervisory Board.
Von Moltke enjoys a good reputation among large investors. The fact that Deutsche Bank has been able to improve its spending discipline in recent years is credited to the German-Australian. Moltke also fought for a long time to get better ratings from the rating agencies.
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With the promotion of the manager, a contract extension in the coming year should now be a mere formality. The bank had extended his contract by three years in 2020. In the past, the usual term for contract extensions was often five years.
CEO Sewing also praised the contract extension: “This gives us the right management structure to be successful in the long term in these times of increasing complexity and volatility. I look forward to executing our growth strategy alongside our strong global leadership team.”
In the past, speculation about possible tensions between Sewing and von Moltke circulated at times, but these subsided after an investor day for the institute at the end of 2019 was relatively successful.
>> Read here: James von Moltke – the conversion specialist
James von Moltke joined Deutsche Bank from Citigroup in 2017. As Treasurer at the major US bank, he was number two in the finance department and brought extensive restructuring experience with him.
The investment banker joined Citigroup in 2009, initially as head of the firm’s mergers and acquisitions department. From a confusing financial supermarket, he formed a much leaner bank. That recommended him for the job at Deutsche Bank.
James von Moltke has a name that is famous in Germany. His grandfather, Helmuth James Graf von Moltke, was a resistance fighter who had founded the “Kreisauer Kreis” resistance group in Germany during National Socialism and was therefore executed in 1945.
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