Surprise at Deutsche Bank as senior FIG banker loses job after less than a year

Is Deutsche Bank becoming more brutal when it comes to cutting costs? Following last week's news that David Campos e Cunha, a director on the London financing and solutions team, had been put at risk of redundancy, we understand that the German bank has now put a managing director who only joined last June at risk too.

Deutsche Bank isn't commenting on the claims, but insiders say that Tom Spreutels is no longer in his role. Spreutels joined Deutsche after nearly 21 years at Citi in June 2019. He was head of corporate banking financial institution group (FIG) coverage at the German bank, until last week or so.

Spreutels' early exit has surprised both the market and DB insiders - all the more so because he was rumoured to have joined the bank on a generous guaranteed bonus. Spreutels will work for DB during his 'at risk' period, but will leave the bank if no appropriate alternative jobs can be found.

The changes come after Deutsche Bank named Stefan Hoops head of the transaction bank in October 2018. Hoops is a close ally of CEO Christian Sewing, and is thought to be shaking things up at DB - possibly by cutting costs across transaction banking and the corporate banking division. 

Sewing aspires to cut costs across Deutsche Bank to €21.8bn this year, down from a previous target of €22bn. It wants to bring costs down to €21bn by 2021.

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