Deutsche Bank, one of Europe’s largest investment banks, is making headlines again. As one of the most highly leveraged banks in Europe at the beginning of the crisis, the bank has been subject to continuous scrutiny by the press, seeing the bank’s persistent failure to adequately deal with the fallout of regulatory fines and address its chronic undercapitalization.
Now Germany’s largest association for private investors and BETTER FINANCE member organization, the Deutsche Schutzvereinigung für Wertpapierbesitz or DSW, is taking the bull by the horns in the name of the banks private investors by requesting the appointment of a special auditor to investigate whether the management and supervisory board of Deutsche Bank violated their legal duties and thereby harmed the company.
On the one hand, DSW is calling for an external special audit into the adequacy of the reserves established by Deutsche Bank in view of the risks deriving from all the ongoing legal and supervisory proceedings against the bank. At the very least the special audit should cover the 20 largest legal proceedings against the bank, including the international investigation into the manipulation of interbank offered lending rates, also known as the LIBOR scandal.
On the other hand, the audit should look into whether all necessary preparations and precautions are taken in terms of compliance with the outcome of the legal proceedings, in order to identify and avoid similar cases in the future.
DSW added this request for a special audit to the agenda of the Deutsche Bank’s annual general meeting of 21 May 2015, in order for the bank’s shareholders to be adequately informed about the established reserves that are necessary to ensure the bank’s future profitability. Shareholders who would like to support DSW’s proposals should contact DSW directly via dsw(at)dsw-info.de.
For more information, please consult the agenda of Deutsche Bank’s annual general meeting.