Employee exits at Deutsche Bank aren’t a new phenomena – there’s been a steady stream of them since the struggling firm announced last summer it would cut 18,000 jobs and sell off its stock-trading business as it tries to stem billions in losses.
At least initially, Deutsche executives planned to not only spare its profitable investment-banking business lines in the US, but to lean into them.
But the credit-trading group, a perennial top competitor which includes the firm’s vaunted distressed-debt desk, has experienced a rash of departures in the US in 2020 as executives angled to cut costs and squeezed compensation.
This all has left the Deutsche Bank short-handed during one of the most active and volatile credit-trading markets in the past decade – one in which competitors are producing record-breaking fixed-income trading results. The firm meanwhile has active searches underway to hire in distressed, high-yield, and investment-grade trading, sources said.
