How swollen is Deutsche Bank really?

Deutsche Bank's new CEO says the German bank is "swollen." Its technology is "inadequate," its structure is "complex", it's "inward looking and bureaucratic," it no longer has the "luxury" of relying on "long term balance sheet usage" to support its sales and trading business.

Superficially, it sounds bad for Deutsche's fixed income business. Upon closer reading, however, Cryan offers Deutsche's traders some scraps of hope. As the bank withdraws its balance sheet from fixed income sales and trading, Cryan says the bank will need to manage "existing positions more actively." And this active management will require traders, especially in areas like XVA. 

In fact, Deutsche has already made plenty of cuts to headcount in the front office. As the chart below shows, Anshu Jain cut front office headcount in the investment bank by 23% between 2010 and the first quarter of this year.