FILE PHOTO: The headquarters of Germany’s Deutsche Bank are pictured in Frankfurt, Germany, September 21, 2020. REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski
March 11, 2022
FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Deutsche Bank paid its chief executive officer 8.8 million euros ($9.68 million) in 2021, a 20% increase from a year earlier, the lender said on Friday, as the country’s top bank came under fire for refusing to sever ties with Russia.
Overall, the lender paid 14% more, or 2.1 billion euros, in bonuses for 2021, rewarding staff for the bank’s most profitable year in a decade.
The pay disclosure in its annual report comes as the bank comes under criticism for its business in Russia as some top competitors cut ties.
Deutsche’s finance chief James von Moltke told CNBC that an exit, “for practical purposes … isn’t an option that’s available to us”.
He added that it would not “be the right thing to do in terms of managing those client relationships and helping them to manage their situation”.
Bill Browder, an investor campaigning to expose corruption, said Deutsche staying in Russia “is completely at odds with the international business community and will create backlash, lost reputation and business in the West.”
“I would be surprised if they are able to maintain this position as the situation in Ukraine continues to deteriorate,” he told Reuters.
($1 = 0.9088 euros)
(Reporting by Tom Sims, John O’Donnell and Frank Siebelt; editing by Miranda Murray and Jason Neely)
Source: One America News Network
