Christian Sewing’s shock was plain to see, the color draining from his face. The chief executive officer of Deutsche Bank AG had just unveiled his long-awaited plan to fix the troubled lender. It included a retreat from equities trading, a focus on corporate banking, and the elimination of 18,000 jobs, a fifth of the workforce. To underscore his conviction, he’d even pledged to invest a chunk of his own pay in Deutsche Bank stock every month.
Then he checked his phone. The shares were in free-fall; they lost as much as 7.3% that day, July 8, and tumbled again on July 9. Shareholders had reached the same, grim verdict: Sewing’s goals were unrealistic for a bank that had consistently disappointed investors. His plan continued to rely on a global investment bank with shrinking revenue and a low-profit retail bank in a home market plagued by fierce competition and negative interest rates.
