Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft (DBK) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Q2 2026 Analyst Conference Call and Live Webcast. I am tell the Chorus Call operator. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Silke-Nicole Szypa, Deputy Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you for joining us for our second quarter and first half year 2026 Results Call. As usual, our Chief Executive Officer, Christian Sewing will speak first; followed by our Chief Financial Officer, Raja Akram. The presentation, as always, is available to download in the Investor Relations section of our website at db.com. Before we get started, let me just remind you that the presentation contains forward-looking statements which may not develop as we currently expect. We therefore ask you to take notice of the precautionary warning at the end of our materials. With that, let me hand over to Christian.

Thank you, Silke, and good morning, everyone. We are very pleased with the performance we delivered and the momentum we achieved in the first half of 2026. We continued to invest in our global house bank, which paves the way for further growth, efficiency gains and value creation for shareholders. We grew revenues to EUR 17.2 billion well on track to reach our full year addition of around EUR 33 billion. This momentum enabled us to deliver a post-tax profit of EUR 4.1 billion, our highest ever for a half year. We made further progress on our key ratios. Post-tax RoTE increased to 11.9%, while our cost-to-income ratio improved to 6.9% despite the impact of SVA accretive strategic actions we took in the second quarter. Our CET1 capital ratio was 13.9%, in line with our operating range. Strong organic capital generation enabled us to support business growth and make distribution deductions in line with our 60% payout ratio. And today, we are taking the next step. We are announcing a new EUR 500 million share buyback from 2026 net income. This is the first time we are executing a buyback from the current year's earnings. A clear sign of the earnings momentum and confidence we have built in the first half. This momentum positions us well to deliver our 2026 objectives and reinforces our confidence in achieving our 2028 targets. Now a few words on the progress we made on scaling our Global Hausbank on Slide 3. We made tangible progress across all 3 levers of our strategy. We delivered revenue growth of 5%, with strong contribution from the Investment Bank and focused growth areas. We maintained strict capital discipline. We announced the sale of the Private Bank's India franchise, which will be SDA-positive upon closing next year, and we took a number of additional capital accretive measures across the franchise. Third, we progressed our scalable operating model. We continue to simplify our operating model in the Private Bank and made targeted investments in technology and front-to-back capabilities across the group. For example, in the Corporate Bank, we continued investing in our cash management capabilities and strengthening our coverage and sales platforms with multinational companies. Our franchise performance indicators are all positive, with significant business volume growth across businesses. Assets under management grew by nearly EUR 270 billion, or 16% year-on-year to EUR 1.92 trillion, supported by record inflows of EUR 56 billion across Private Bank and Asset Management in the first half year. Loans increased by [ 4% ] year-on-year, driven by momentum in the Corporate Bank and FIC financing. Deposits rose by 7% year-on-year, with strength across the Corporate and Private Bank. Furthermore, we delivered strong performance across all our divisions, as you can see on Slide 4. All divisions delivered returns on tangible equity of 12% or higher. The Private Bank transformation continues. We made progress on our target ratios despite absorbing costs relating to continued investments at the exit of its India franchise and grew client assets by more than EUR 55 billion in the first half year. The division has now completed the branch closures planned for 2026 and continue to strengthen Wealth Management coverage. Asset Management grew assets under management by [ EUR 97 billion ] in the second quarter alone, which included record net client flows of EUR 25 billion. The Corporate Bank continued to grow business volumes in both loans and deposits, reflecting the strength of our corporate client franchise. And the Investment Bank supported clients through hidden market volatility, reinforcing our position as a trusted partner and gateway for investing in Europe while also growing EMEA market share in Investment Banking and capital markets. Based on disclosures from [ Per Sagar ], we are confident that with our record second quarter performance, we have also expanded our market share in FIC. In our investor deep dive in November, we made clear that we view an RoTE of greater than 13% at the floor, dependent on the successful execution of our strategy. We also identified several trends that could provide further upside over time, and we briefly update you on how those trends are developing today. First, German structural reforms, including health and pension reforms are taking shape. The government's 34-point plan should boost economic activity in the years ahead. Fiscal expansion is slowly but steadily gaining momentum. Investment spending in the infrastructure and defense sectors has started. Our Corporate Bank and Investment Bank are ideally placed to capture opportunities. We have seen encouraging steps in private pension reforms. With Deutsche Bank's combination of 19 million Private Bank customers in Germany, Wealth Management expertise and Germany's leading Asset Management franchise, we are well placed to support existing and new clients with investment solutions and help them participate in opportunities as the market develops. The second trend is which is evolving even faster than we expected, and the potential benefits for us are becoming clearer. We are embedding AI across workflows to boost productivity and drive scalable growth. We also see scope to enhance client experience, deepen client coverage and capture share of wallet through AI-driven intelligence. This gives us potential for both incremental operating efficiencies and revenue both in the future. The third trend is savings and investment union. Across Europe, momentum is building, especially as pension reforms are top of the agenda in Germany. Our asset gathering businesses, alongside the Investment Bank and Corporate Bank are very well placed to capture opportunities from more integrated markets, new frameworks and growing investment flows as and when they arise, but also to provide clients with access to evolving capital markets and assist with financing needs. The fourth strength we discussed in November is a more level regulatory playing field. We are encouraged to see an increasing policy focus on competitiveness, simplification and growth in Europe. Over time, we expect this to be supportive on several dimensions. The European Commission has taken a number of initiatives, including the recent proposal with the broader legislative package expected in early 2027. We believe that among European bank regulators, there is both increasing flexibility and political will to address some of the unintended consequences of CRR3 while not compromising on resilience. This includes support for lending activities, such as mortgage and financing for unrated corporates by addressing the transitional arrangements currently in FIC. Temporary relief on FRTB as soon as January 2027 and an expected permanent released by a legislative package later on would also maintain the competitiveness of European banks in trading and capital markets. In addition, efforts to streamline the EU macro prudential framework could lead to fewer buffers and more simplified requirements across member space. In other words across all 4 areas, the trends are positive. Of course, the speed and exact shape of change is hard to predict, but the overall direction is encouraging. What this means for us, first, our financial and strategic progress reinforces our confidence in delivering an RoTE of greater than 13% in 2028. And the developments in these trends strengthen our view that there is considerable upside to our targets. Second, we are actively positioning the bank to capture these opportunities with targeted investments focused capital deployment and continued engagement with policymakers. With that, let me hand over to Raja.

Thank you, Christian, and good morning. We delivered another solid second quarter with net revenues of EUR 8.5 billion and return on tangible equity of 11% and a CET1 ratio of 13.9%. Profit before tax increased by 11% year-on-year, while the cost income ratio grew to 63%, despite the impact of SBA accretive strategic actions in the quarter, including the exit of Private Banks in the franchise. The revenues were around 9% year-on-year, making these 20 consecutive quarters of revenue growth. All divisions contributed to this strategy growth led by the performance in the Investment Bank and strong contributions from our focused growth areas. CLO also contributed positively to revenues this quarter mainly due to valuation and target differences, which we expect to revert over the remainder of the year with our full year C&O guidance remaining relatively unshifted. We continue to see strong activity across our asset gathering businesses, with record net flows in asset management and another quarter of robust inflows in Private Bank, supporting a 16% year-on-year increase in assets under management, which are now EUR 1.9 trillion, continued Corporate Bank deposit growth reinforces the broad momentum behind our client-led growth strategy. Overall, despite a continued dynamic backdrop and specific strategic measures taken during the quarter, we delivered revenue growth ahead of cost growth year-on-year and maintained strong capital discipline, fully aligned with our 2028 objectives. Let me now turn to revenues in more detail. Starting on Slide 8. We saw a strong growth in the private bank underpinned by both Wealth Management and Personal Banking, while Asset Management also contributed positively. The Corporate Bank deliver sequential growth as promised. We are encouraged by the continued underlying momentum in the franchise, so by higher loan and deposit volumes and signs that activity ingevity is picking up. Investment Bank results were driven by a record second quarter by a leading franchise, supported by clear improvement in Investment Banking and capital markets. Looking at revenue proposition, net interest income demonstrated a solid increase driven by loan growth and had rollover with trading and other income broadly flat year-on-year. Net commission fee income showed continued strength benefiting from growth in Wealth Management as well as seasonally stronger performance with the institutional plant services in the Corporate Bank. Overall, our non-investment banking businesses continue to contribute more than 60% to our revenue mix. Let me now move to NII on Slide 9. NII was solid at EUR 3.6 billion across the key banking book segments and other funding with both loan and other revenues, contributing positively compared to the prior year quarter. In the second quarter, the policy-related NII continued to benefit from underlying volume growth and the contribution from our hedge portfolio, while known NII benefit from strong life growth. Looking at the divisions. In the Private Bank, margins continue to progress steadily, particularly in deposits with volumes broadly stable in the quarter. The Corporate Bank that interest income also went up sequentially with strong underlying NII growth across both deposits and loans supported by increased client activity, resulting in volume growth. In Fixed Financing, revenues remained strong, benefiting from loan growth. For the full year, we expect NII across key banking [indiscernible] segments and other funding to slightly exceed our prior guidance of around [ EUR 14 billion ] and benefits from recent rate decisions at the Board pronounced in 2027 and 2028, reflecting our structural hedging approach. As always, you can find details of the benefit for the long-term hedge portfolio rollover on Slide 25 of the Appendix. Turning to Slide 10. Noninterest expenses were up 8% year-on-year at about EUR 5.3 billion. The year-on-year cost increase reflects increase in [indiscernible] and performance-related compensation, the absence of prior litigation releases and one-off costs of close to EUR 100 million related to the recently announced exit of the Private Bank's India franchise. Excluding the aforementioned litigation releases in the prior year quarter and the exit India franchise, the year-on-year cost increase would have been 4%. As planned, incremental investments increased to around EUR 200 million, including severance costs of slightly less than [ EUR 5 million ] mainly reflected Private Bank operated on optimization. The remaining investments are focused on technology at, [indiscernible] Wealth Management, IBCM as well as the expansion of Private Bank solutions to support our capital line growth agenda. Importantly, operating efficiencies of around EUR 200 million, mainly from workforce and target operating for measures continue to largely offset the incremental investments. As I said in April, we have kept our investing plans aligned with external environment. As we continue to execute those plans and efficiency benefits accelerate, we expect positive jaws to become increasingly visible in the next 2 years. With that, let me turn to provisions for paid losses on Slide 11. Starting asset quality overall portfolio components remains strong. Revision for brand losses was [ EUR 450 million ]. as previously discussed and consistent with our disciplined approach to managing financial resources, we do further targeting action to derisk our portfolio and improve our overall risk profile. We have a planned exit of certain nonperforming CRE exposures. These actions had an impact of approximately 10 basis points in the quarter and will be overall capital accretive once executed. Excluding these [indiscernible] actions, CRE [indiscernible] lower quarterly or separately and released a portion of the management of release. Underlying employer depots remained in line with expectations, supporting a normalized average provision rate of roughly 30 basis points through 2028. Turning to GAAP on Slide 12. Starting with the CET1 ratio, we ended the quarter at 13.9%, up 11 basis points compared to the first quarter in [indiscernible] operating rate and income better deductions for coupons attributed 45 basis points, reflecting strong second quarter findings, while deduction from distribution of 27 basis points represents a 50% payout ratio that we committed to starting the 2026 financials. In the EUR 500 million share buyback announced today has no incremental impact on our CET1 ratio as it is fully covered by CET1 capital deductions. The other category increased by 11 basis points due to equity compensation and reduced capital reductions mainly for our deferred tax assets. [indiscernible] assets included by EUR 5 billion, excluding FX effects of EUR 1 billion. The main driver of this increase was business growth, [indiscernible] growth in loans and principal at guaranteed for Asset Management. This was partially offset by increased RWA benefits from securitization and reduced CVA risk-weighted assets. We plan to launch new SRT platforms in the second half of the year to create additional capital capacity. Lastly, the other category of risk-weighted assets includes effects of [indiscernible] calibrations. This now turn to divisional performance, starting with the Private Bank on Slide 14. The Private Bank continues to deliver tangible orders, supported by the robust revenue momentum sustained asset guided and disciplined execution strategic priorities. Return [indiscernible] was 11% and the cost/income ratio stood at [indiscernible] despite absorbing the upfront costs related to the divestiture of the Private Bank's India franchise as well as severance costs. The transaction supports a sharper focus on scale and competitive strength. Excluding the impact of the divestiture, return on tangible equity would have been approximately 13% and the cost/income ratio of 66%, highlighting the strength of the underlying business performance. The revenues increased by 8% driven by 10% growth in net interest income and an 8% rise in net commission and fee income with both Personal Banking and Wealth Management contributing. Gross lending revenues grew by 6%, mainly from higher revenues from deposits, while Wealth Management revenues increased by 11% driven by investment products and deposits. [indiscernible] continued to show solid momentum with net AUM flows of EUR 9 billion, primarily into investment products, required assets rising by 7% to almost [ EUR 850 million ] in the first 6 months. Deposits increased 4% year-on-year, driven by undermanaged inflows and wealth management growth. Loan development remain aligned with our strategy, driven by continued expansion in Wealth Management lending and offset by targeted reductions in non-SVA retail portfolios and the classification of India franchise has held for sale. Excluding the aforementioned actions, broader net loans we have grown by 2% year-on-year. The Private Bank continues to rational this branch network having completed all 100 [indiscernible] has already onboarded [ 316 Wealth ] Management coverage hires well on track towards a target of 250-plus coverage hires. So interest expense rose by 8% year-on-year, reflecting the impact of the fore-mentioned divestiture and continued incremental investments, including higher severance costs of more than [ EUR 80 billion ]. We'd expect the cost and future growth, filing and other investment initiatives to increase in the second half of the year with the remaining of flexibility of the [indiscernible]. Gradient resilience and provision for credit losses has been in line with expectations. The year-on-year increase in maturity driven by [indiscernible] releases in the prior year period. Turning to Slide 15. Asset Management delivered a solid quarter, benefiting from favorable market conditions, stronger asset flows and improving credit cost selected at the asset prices. [indiscernible] revenues increased 4% year-on-year, primarily driven by higher management fees up 13% year-on-year, supplied by higher average assets under management and stronger long-term growth. Sequentially, performance fees were lower getting the recognition of significant fee to an infrastructure front in the first quarter. Noninterest expenses increased by 7% year-on-year, reflecting higher business activity, including wire-driven costs and share price-related compensation effects. The increases are aligned to the growth initiatives delivers. Turning to flows. Net gross about record [ EUR 25 million ] in the quarter, including EUR 13 billion of cash inflows. The long-term net flows amounted to [ EUR 12 million ], driven by continued strength in positive pros with extractors remain well positioned to continue capturing strong net flows and supported by positive contributions from active asset classes. Within Active, SQI maintained strong momentum while active equity return to volume net flows, benefiting our further improved investment performance in client demand across sector strategies. [indiscernible] assets in management increased to almost EUR 1.2 trillion, up 18% year-over-year, with reflected favorable market effects, net flows and FX movements, partly offset by infrastructure-related asset paydowns. For further details, please refer to DWS' disclosure on the Investor Relations website. Let us move to the Corporate Bank on Slide 16 before closing with the Investment Bank. The Corporate Bank once again delivered a strong return on tangible equity of 16.4% and a cost income ratio of 62%, sustaining its high level of profitability. As guidance to this, we now see interest rate and FX headwinds diminished while positive business momentum has become well pronounced. Second quarter revenues EUR 1.9 billion, up 1% year-on-year contain against a very strong prior year quarter. Corporate Treasury Services and Business Banking each grew by 3%, supported by higher business volumes, interest rate hedging and growth in net commission and fee income with corporate treasury services. The 6% decline in institutional and services reflected the nonrecords of prior amenities and the remaining impact of FX segments. Sequentially, Corporate Bank revenue increased by 5%, driven by seasonally strong net commission fee in [indiscernible] services and higher business volumes and corporate treasury services. Business volumes were strong, with average deposit notes for [indiscernible] is sequentially primarily driven by higher deposits in corporate gas management and higher [indiscernible] for debt. No interest expenses were slightly higher as volume growth, franchise investments in the nonrecurrence of a prior litigation provision release were partially across [indiscernible]. Provision losses remain well on take reflecting solid underlying portfolio quality. I'll now turn to the Investment Bank on Slide 17. The revenues for the second quarter were 19% higher year-over-year, driven by a record second quarter with [indiscernible] and significantly higher revenues at [indiscernible] Significant year-on-year regrown in [indiscernible] markets was primarily driven by strength in rates and credit rating. Both businesses benefit from a nonrepeat of the [indiscernible] seen early in the second quarter last year. In addition, we saw headline activity and credit rating benefit from a strong environment for distressed product trading. FIC financing performance continued to be robust with revenues essentially flat to matter strong prior year. Were this year, the revenue increased 36% year-on-year and 17% sequentially, demonstrating clear improvement. The year-over-year increase reflected strong growth in both equity estimation and advisory is line with the strategically balancing IBCM at the indicated of our Investment Day. I [indiscernible] the visibility for the second half of 2026, points to further significant year-on-year revenue. At our interest expenses were 6% higher year, materially driven by the targeted high combined with performance-related compensation. Loan growth year-on-year was primarily in fixed financing driven by the financing and solutions business including [indiscernible] while the CRE book remain broadly flat. Provision for credit losses was EUR 174 million and included impacts of aforementioned plan, capital accreted exits. From a year-on-year perspective, these were was offset by a partial payment release and in nonrecurring afoot dates recorded the prior year freight. With that, I'll turn to the outlook on Slide 18. We are on track to meet our comic objectives. Our divisions are performing well and strong total revenues are putting us fairly on track to comfortably deliver or revenue addition of around EUR 33 million with further growth in the key banking book NII and other funding as well as continued growth in that comision fee. We continue to purely based on plant investments throughout the year generating operating efficiencies and delivered on our full year expense guidance in line with our Investor Day commitments. And as we start with the first quarter results, we're seeing increasing signs of potential incremental productivity benefits led by AI and organization certification versus our earlier assumptions for 2028. Asset volume remains strong and portfolios are performing in line with expectations. We remain vigilant to potential geopolitical and other risks in the operating environment and expect our portfolio to remain resilient to those challenges. On an underlying basis, we continue to expect provision of operating losses to reduce slight year-on-year. and we will continue to evaluate limited targeted actions in both data accretive and further risk portfolio. We remain committed to delivering attractive capital returns that is rising to continue to make CET1 capital reductions in line with a 60% PR ratio. The EUR 500 million share buyback in 2026 net income announced today will commence on completion of the EUR 1 billion share buyback, which is currently underway. First half year profitability lays a solid foundation for strong operating performance in 2026 and you can see this in our businesses, particularly in the Private Bank where disciplined execution is leading to higher profitability and with [indiscernible] with business organic bidding. And with that, we look forward to your questions. Thank you.

All right. Thank you very much, Raja. Operator, we are now ready to take your questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Chris Hallam from Goldman Sachs International.

You're on track for EUR 33 billion revenue ambition this year. You've highlighted further growth in NII, the improving IBCM pipeline and stronger Corporate Bank momentum. And I guess against that, CNO should normalize in the back half and investment spending looks like it may also arise in the second half. So how should we think about the balance of those tailwinds and headwinds when we're trying to solve for H2 performance? And what are the key trends you're expecting to see on a divisional level in the second half of this year? That's the first question. And then secondly, what's your conviction level, I guess, mark-to-market on achieving that greater than 13% return on tangible equity target for 2028? And how do you see the medium-term picture improving more broadly? If I look at Slide 5, you've mentioned in remarks, considerable upside to 2028 targets. If I look through those themes on Slide 5, many of them kick in next year. So is it still a case of, I guess, is it a case of both higher 2028 ambitions and maybe also more front-loaded or less linear progress towards those ambitions?

Chris, thank you for your question. Let me start and Raja can obviously add on. Let me start with your first question, so to say, on this year's performance, 2026. Look, first of all, really pleased with what we have seen over the last 6 months. It I think reinforces the strategy which we have stated at our Investor Day. And what is actually satisfying me most is that we see this encouraging performance in all 4 businesses. It's not only driven by one business it actually demonstrates the strength and the diversification of our franchise. And Chris, to your question then, what does it mean for 2026 from a revenue point of view and from a performance and momentum point of view, we see this momentum continuing in all 4 businesses. Private Bank and Asset Management, to be honest, you have seen the assets under management flow. This is continuing. I will get later back to your Page 5 question. But with all that, what is also happening here in Germany, in particular in the Pension reform, you can see that actually the attention of the people to do something on their own passion and to go for investments is sort of say, on a high, and we are benefiting from this. And to be honest, we can also see that in July. Corporate Bank, I'm glad. Actually, we are doing better in the Corporate Bank in Q2 than we expected. We have seen this increase or this revenue improvement we forecasted for Q3 and Q4 already earlier, really lead, both on the deposit and on the lending side, but also on the fee side. So we are moving into the right direction in the Corporate Bank. And I would say that this is now a trend which you will continue to see. So we forecast that Q3 and Q4 are sequentially showing better revenues, increasing revenues. So I would say that we see this turnaround in the Corporate Bank. So all the investments we have done, the focus also here on Germany, but on our Business Banking, mid-cap banking Multinational Corporate Banking and institutional cash management is paying off. So that's good. And then actually in the Investment Bank, I'm very happy. We, I think, have taken or it looks like that we have taken market share across the board, in particular, in the FIC business. It's actually fantastic to see what Ram has done again in Q2. And with those markets like we have seen it in Q1 and Q2, but also now the constructive start in July, I do believe that given the market position we have, given the risk management needs of the clients, which we see in our day-to-day meetings, I see a very constructive development in FIC. And you can see actually that in the IBCM business, it happened that what we expected and that is a strong increase in -- and I would say that looking at our pipeline, looking at Q3 and Q4, I actually feel that the second half in the IBCM business is even stronger than the first half. So overall, I would say, across the business, of course, always taking into account that in the markets business, the first quarter is the strongest one, and we have some seasonality. I'm actually -- I remain very confident on the revenue guidance and therefore, full confidence in the EUR 33 billion. Again, I want to be also disciplined when it comes to outlook. We have a complex environment out in this world. But I would not be surprised if we can even slightly exceed the EUR 33 billion for the full year. On the cost side, to be honest, we are not changing our guidance. We always guided for slightly above EUR 21 billion, and that is unchanged we are continuing to invest into technology, wealth management, IBCM exactly in line with the plan, which we laid out in November. Now obviously, in case we would see a weaker revenue development, it gives us, obviously, immediately the flexibility to do something, but we don't see that. And therefore, we leave this guidance on the cost side unchanged. But I'm actually very happy with the discipline, which is really across the bank on the cost management. So then looking at the quality of the loan book and taking it all together, to be honest, I think we will see a strong operating I think it's too early to change, so to say, the guidance, let's leave the guidance with the where it is. I love to beat and raise, as you know. And I think it's exactly the time to simply keep your head down, work every day, make sure that we keep the momentum and then I'm actually very positive on 2026. Now let me add to immediately and go to 2028. And again, Raja may want to add to that. First of all, everything what I said for 2026 and when I look at the momentum of the businesses, also, if I see the client reactions, I was just in Asia, I was before that in the U.S. The scheme I told you before that actually the world wants to have, in particular, in these types and alternative in Europe, a strong European alternative when it comes to Global Banking when it comes to Investment Banking, this is unbroken. And therefore, I would say that actually everything what we are seeing from an operating point of view, the focus also in our business on capital-light business is actually filling me with confidence that we will see that momentum and the overall development of the bank from an operating point of view also in '27 and '28. So no change to that. I even feel slightly better. Now you reference Page 5. And obviously, Page 5 gives us more confidence. Look, I'm positive and optimistic on that what has been announced in Germany, in particular, over the last 6 to 8 weeks. You asked me rightfully in the first quarter whether Germany is lagging process -- progress. And we were all a bit disappointed with slow reforms in the first 12 months. But I can see actually that competitiveness and growth has been put at the core of the agenda now. And both or 3 things health reform, pension reform and the 34 reform plan by the government is actually very positive. And you have also seen -- Actually, the EFO inside coming out earlier this week was strong enough than we anticipated. So actually, the kind of tailwind which we see from a German reform point of view, is positive and in my view, will kick in, in '27 to a lesser extent in '26, we said that already last time, but I would say it is an upside in '27 and, obviously, then '28. In that pension reform, obviously, for us as a bank, super positive. And in this regard, I'm actually surprised by the depth of the pension reform, in particular in Pillar 1 and Pillar 3 -- Pillar 2. I would have loved to see even more, but let's see what tariff partners are doing about the recommendations, but Pillar 1 and Pillar 3, very good incubator for our business, in particular, in Asset Management and in the Private Bank. And then to be honest, I also see good progress, and I'm optimistic when it comes to the latest reports from Brussels for the EU reforms and when it comes to bank competitiveness. I'm glad that items like revolve CRR3 capital buffers trying to achieve more level playing field has been put into the agenda. And therefore, looking at all of these, I would say, and Raja talked about AI, obviously, before, I think these upside levers are playing out exactly like we hoped. But that gives me obviously, all the confidence that we can achieve the larger 30%. And to be honest, if everything is decided like it is announced, and this is now obviously to be shown over the next couple of months, in particular in Germany, I do believe that there is some meaningful upside above the larger 30%. But Again, like I said for '26, I don't like to change items after 3 or 6 months after an IDD, Let's beat and race, but the overall environment, very constructive and most importantly, underlying business is really doing well.

The next question comes from the line of Anke Reingen from RBC.

The first is on the loan losses and the comment about underlying reiterated. But can you clarify your comment about the additional loan losses to derisk the portfolio. I mean what sort of like magnitude are we talking about? Could we be looking at a reported level '26? Could be of '25? Or is there a risk that an overshoot on the EUR 33 billion revenues is basically offset by higher loan losses? And which specific areas are you thinking about? And then secondly, on the costs, about the 2026 guidance about -- slightly above EUR 21 billion or the 3%. How should we think about the sequential trends from the Q2 levels into the full year number?

Thank you, Anke, for your question. Let me take the cost question first, and Christian already spoke about it a little bit, and that would be helpful for me to kind of conclude. Look, as he talked about, we assume at this point that we will get close to our original target that obviously assumes that we will spend the remaining investment in the cadence that we have decided. And obviously, investments pacing is not always precise depending on technology and things like that. But don't forget that included in our estimate is also almost EUR 400 million of additional productivity that is also coming in the second half of the year. So it's not just the -- that the investments are going at an incremental pace for the second half of the year, but we also have productivity offsetting those. So that's why we feel very comfortable about the number that we gave. And we think that, as I mentioned last time, I feel very comfortable that we're not going to overshoot that number. In fact, if we're pacing comes down a little bit differently that we may be slight below. So that's the way I would think about it, that if everything goes according to plan, we should be getting to our number on a pretty even basis. Obviously, we have a couple of hundred million of productivity falling out each year -- each quarter and then offset by investment spend for the remaining two quarters. That's how we have planned it, and we'll see how the quarter evolves and how fast we can onboard the clients, how fast we can hire the people that we want to hire that obviously dictates the amount of investment spend. In terms of CLP, I think I would just like to reiterate that overall, we are seeing better credit trends in 2026 versus 2025. I think whether it's a private bank, where we're seeing very low level of revisions, Corporate Bank performed according to plan, which was already better than expectations. And on the Investment Bank, we may -- as you noticed, we made a very specific decision and a very targeted decision for around EUR 100 million to derisk our commercial real estate portfolio and also free up capital sooner than we ordinarily would have. So at this point, our conviction remains that we should be doing better this year versus last year. That said, if we see another opportunity of around the same magnitude in the second half of the year to do something that is equally capital accretive and equally beneficial from us from a derisking perspective, we'll consider it, but it depends on whether the market gives us that opportunity to exit certain positions that we think we would like to. But in terms of magnitude, I don't think that we should assume that it will be something that's dramatically more different than what we have already done. And I look at consensus that may be actually the high end of where we may end up even with these actions. And in the absence of any additional actions, we feel pretty good about our guidance in terms of being lower year-over-year. But really, the key thing for us is does it derisk our commercial real estate portfolio even further. And does it give us capital relief sooner than if you were to just wait on in a normal exit.

We now have a question from the line of Tarik El Mejjad from Bank of America.

First, I'll start on capital. So you had a capital bid this quarter, and you are above your guidance of being to midrange in each quarter this year. And this is despite the strong growth in the IB in the quarter. I mean -- and at this pace with the SRT, Raja, you mentioned you will do in the second half, you should definitely be above the 14% target for the full year. I know you guide for surplus capital above 60% only from 2027, but what would you refrain you from distributing more than the 60% from this year? Is there a scenario where in full year, you assess your surplus above and decide to adjust your payout highly -- higher? And in terms of front-loading, you've done a front-loading of '26 dividend in Q4, if you feel confident about how the second half evolves, would you be ready to announce another front-loading in Q3 executed in Q4 calendar and Q1 calendar next year? That's one of my first question. Second one is on the revenues. And I mean there is a big M&A ongoing in the -- in Germany. And could you actually highlight what could be the -- what's the benefit from you get from [indiscernible] from the Commercial Banking credit merger in Germany? And how would you benefit from that and at what time line? If I can squeeze the last one, just to follow up on the SIU. Would you quantify what could be the uptick in RoTE from these measures? Some of the banks started that. We did some analysis, but it'd be interesting to see if internally you start to work on that because it's not that far away. And actually, the securitization markets because it's down to that, what do you think the securitization market in Europe could be on the back of the discussions we have in triple tide post summer?

Thank you for questions. Let me take the one on capital, and I'm going to pass it on to Christian to take the more difficult ones. Tarik, I think we have been pretty clear that for the rest of the year, we feel like we should be comfortably operating in the operating range of 13.5% to 14% given the timing and the pacing of some of the benefits that we're going to have, not only from secure insurance, but some of the other actions. As I mentioned, we have taken a charge for the India sale, but the benefit will really come once the sale closes some of the exits for NPE, we have actually obviously taken the charge, but we are now in the process of executing the sales. So a little bit depends on the pacing on when these offsetting actions happened. So that's why I'm a little bit more cautious about guiding to 14%. But I think more importantly, the important part is that we were very clear in our Investor Day guidance that we have to be sustainably over 14% before we start executing on share buybacks. Now, that's a judgment call of what sustainable means, whether it's one quarter or two quarters or three quarters, but I would think it's definitely more than one quarter. In addition, as you know, we are doing a pretty major change in our cadence already. We went from 50% to 60%. In addition, we -- it's the first time that we did a share buyback based on 6 months' worth of earnings, which actually shows a lot of confidence by us but also from our supervisors that they allow us to do a share buyback in year. So I would assume, Tarik, we will go through another couple of quarters. And when we have much better visibility, at least another quarter or two for the forward look, and we would think probably about another share buyback application. So I would think that it's normal to assume for now where we are that a 6-month cadence is a pretty good one. We have already -- with this announcement, would have done EUR 1.5 billion in the first half of the year versus EUR 1 billion that we did in all of 2025. So we are accelerating quite substantially. So if things go well, and we have -- we see no reason why the second half of the year should not be as strong, then obviously, we'll consider something towards the latter half of the year again. And then once we are sustainably about 14%, it is really our intention to put share buybacks at the forefront because we have enough capital to operate the business. And frankly speaking, we are freeing up capital to invest in the business through many other measures, whether it's sales or portfolios whether it's SRTs or exiting NPEs. So I think we are able to manage business growth by freeing up capital quite organically.

Thank you, Raja. Tarik. Let me address the other two questions on Germany and then on the regulatory front. Look, first of all, I think we also need to watch what is happening. But of course, we have done and we are doing our homework, let me put it this way. And I think actually, everybody knows that we looked into a potential situation in 2019. So we know exactly what is possible on revenue synergies and revenue dis-synergies. So you have also seen over the last 12 months that also on senior positions we have made targeted investments in Germany on the Corporate Bank side, on the wealth management side on the Private Banking side, to honestly benefit from that because, of course, we will see that this is a revenue opportunity for us, and we are prepared for that. And of course, it's also our duty and obligation to go for that. Now it's actually the timing of that depends on the business. On the Corporate Bank side, you see far more active discussions with clients already because they obviously plan out, they are trying so to say, to risk manage their own situation. And therefore, there are lots of discussions on the Corporate Bank side. On the Private Bank side, it depends between retail clients and Wealth Management clients. On the Wealth Measurement side, you also start to have discussions and active discussions on the retail side that happens usually once things really happened, if you mean what I'm saying. But I would say, given the magnitude of potential revenue dissynergies we would have seen, based on our analysis in 2019, that could mean a meaningful opportunity on the revenue side over the next 3 years. And we will absolutely go for it. Otherwise, we wouldn't have invested into our organization, in particular in Germany. And Fabrizio, Claudio and Stefan Hoops are obviously fully on it. So it's a net positive. The SRU and regulatory changes, look, as I said in my first answer, I think it's too early now to talk about potential increases in terms of our TE or target revisions. But clearly, in particular, if you look on all the announced intentions when it comes to CRR3, when it comes to FRTB when it comes to buffers when it comes to a review of software amortization that can have a meaningful impact. Now Tarik, we are talking about a political process. We are talking about now in an announcement which needs to be executed, and therefore, we should not front run this process. But everything what I said also to Chris's question on 2028, I'm far more confident not only in exceeding the 13% then -- and I was already confident in November '25. But I have the highest confidence since then now based on our operating performance and the the changes we see, for instance, on the regulatory side, it needs to be approved. It needs to go into the legislative package and process end of '26, '27. And then I do believe that we see actually a good tailwind in the latter year of '27 and in particular, in '28 from a regulatory point of view.

Next question comes from the line of Kian Abouhossein from JP Morgan.

The first one is regarding the Private Bank, which is showing strong flows and gross income decline. I wanted to ask about the adviser hiring where you indicated 116 hires already and the target was 250 plus at the Investor Day. And clearly, you're well ahead of expectation. I just wanted to see how we should think about adviser hires going forward, competition. And lastly, how we should think about net money flows considering you're hiring faster and maybe even more, it might be. If you could clarify that. Secondly, on the Corporate Bank, I don't understand what is going on in the Corporate Bank because I see loan growth. I see asset growth. Leverage exposure is growing, margins are declining and risk-weighted assets are not growing if you adjust for operational risk-weighted assets. Now if you're giving out loans, which are cheap in order to get fee business, the fee business is not really growing significantly either. So I'm just trying to understand what I'm missing on the P&L. And your confidence in the second half and beyond because you clearly have the CAG of 8% and over a certain time period, which now has to be even higher more like 10% to get there implied. Is it all hedges? Or how should we think about this? Because I don't see the delta that you're going to create on the revenue side?

Yes. Kian, it's Christian. Thanks for your questions. Let me take the Private Bank one and Raja is going for the Corporate Bank. Look, my first answer to you on the private bank is actually a very, very nice story. And if you would see me now, I'm smiling because this operating leverage in the Private Bank will continue. And we really need to deep dive then into the private bank because what we can see is a constant continuous cost takeout in particular in the retail business because Claudio with his team are following up on all the cost reduction program, whether it's the front-to-back processes I think it was in our prepared remarks in that we finished already the branch closures, which we had planned for the entire year 2026. It's done at the end of June. And obviously, we can see that costs are moving out. And then with the investments into the technology into our digital assistance and digital assistance program, we actually are even improving at the same time the client experience. And therefore, you see in the retail bank also benefiting from all the attention Germany is now on pension and investment that we see rising revenues and at the same time, costs coming down. You and I discussed it for years, it was badly needed that we get this operating leverage we have seen in now quarter-by-quarter, and it will continue. Now on the Wealth Management side, it's actually a real growth strategy. And you're right, we have hired approximately half of the people we targeted. And as Raja was saying, I mean, we are targeting to do our full investment program for 2026. And that includes that we are targeting to get to the 250 people. Now it always depends whether at the end of the day, we will get these people in, but I'm actually quite happy with the progress. And you are also right that we can see that this -- on the Wealth Management side that actually, they are quicker operational and getting assets under management in than we initially thought. And that next to the general trend which we see in Germany and again and again with our 19 million or 18 million retail clients that we grow the investment business, this is coming on top from the Wealth Management side, which is a pure growth business. So I really do believe that we will see this nice operating leverage in the Retail Bank costs further down. Given our flow business and in particular, the focus on investment business, also in the retail business, increasing revenues and Wealth Management is a very nice growth story. Claudio has shown it now for years. And last but not least, it's also really nice to see that people simply want to join Deutsche Bank. And that was different 2 or 3 years ago. We had difficulties at some point in time to get the right people. Now we don't have that anymore. They want to work for us. And therefore, it's actually really enjoyable story. Over to you.

Thanks, Christian. Kian, I think on Corporate Bank, I'm not going to rerepeat,I guess my last quarters discussion about the FX and interest rate headwinds because while they are still there, they're clearly diminishing now, which gives us great confidence that we actually can exit out of this year, mid- to high single digits, which may not be all the way up to [indiscernible], but that actually gives us the confidence. Look, it's clear that we are growing fee and commission income in mid-single digits. This quarter, again, we did very well in trust and security services as well as instructuring fees on trade finance and lending. The margins for the most part are pretty stable. They're modestly down, but that's obviously -- it's not that meaningful given how much of it comes from deposits. And especially when you look at the hedging strategy that we have, especially in light of the higher interest rate environment versus what we had assumed we have a much bigger upside and tailwind for '27, 2028 versus what a Corporate Bank is actually one of the bigger beneficiaries of that upside. So combined the fact that we are growing fees mid-single digits, a much better interest rate outlook, rationalization of our portfolio, which was low yielding, which we are continuing to do on the trade side and the fact that Christian talked about that this is on the back of Germany, not even being full speed yet, gives us a lot of confidence. I had promised you guys that we will show positive year-on-year growth on the Corporate Bank in the second half of the year. We managed to do that by a little bit in the second quarter. But when I look in my forward outlook, I have 0 pause on -- that we're going to exit this year out with a very healthy growth rate. And the fact that the beta is also holding up, by the way, just so you know, on deposits. We have slightly higher beta on our deposits despite the competition. We have much better betas on U.S. and other currencies. And in addition, despite Germany not being full speed, we grew our German lending book by 3% this quarter. So all the indicators for the Corporate Bank give me great confidence that we will show you all what we promised, which is good growth rate. As you know, the RoTE is still pretty solid for the Corporate Bank. It has not been impacted. So we think we have some ways to get it in there. But all in all, the story for the Corporate Bank is playing out, I would say, exactly how we had crafted this plan. And I think the only way for us to prove that would be to go through one or two more quarters when you start seeing the 1% growth turn into 5% growth and 5% turn into 8%. But I'm honestly super not fast about what's happening with Corporate Bank because with the interest rate tailwinds with the German Cisco and the fact that we are actually seeing loan growth after a long time, and that too in trade finance, which is where all the good stuff happens, the fees come associated with that, the payments business has come with that. I feel pretty good about it where we are.

And may I just follow up, how much of the uplift in revenues is hedge related then in the second half? Because we talk a lot about uplift, uplift, uplift and hedges, but we don't actually know how much it is.

As I said in my prepared remarks, the majority of the the benefit comes into '27 and '28 because of the way our hedges are set up, we don't leave ourselves super exposed in the short end. So you would already -- we obviously have -- going to benefit, but the real improvement is actually coming from 5% to 6% fee and commission growth and the increase in the deposit balances that you were seeing and the fact that the betas are holding up pretty well. So the growth of the Corporate Bank is not super dependent on this interest rate position, but it's actually super helped by it because what's happening is that now we are able to reset these hedges and the '27 and '28 impacts are going to be much more pronounced than the '26 impact.

We now have a question from the line of Giulia Miotto from Morgan Stanley.

I have to start on assets. Is it correct that you have currently released about 100 basis points of capital, thanks to SRT? And how much more can you do? What are your thoughts when you think about capital optimization by SRTs? Do you have any limitation in terms of density, which is declining or in terms of regulatory limits? And will this change our opinion once the securitization package, which we have all been discussing for more than a year, finally, hopefully, exits dialogue and gets approved. So that's the first question on SRTs. The second question is instead on costs. So consensus for 2026 is at EUR 21.2 billion, are you comfortable with the number? Can we assume that we don't get another perhaps bump higher guidance from you as we approach Q3?

Giulia, let me just take the second question first. I -- it's only my second quarter here. But I would like to reassure you that we feel very comfortable with our expense guidance. We have planned the year very meticulously. We communicated what we wanted to invest in quite upfront, so there will be never any surprises. And based on where we are at today, I see no reason based on what management knows that why we would not hit close to where everybody has. Obviously, It's a EUR 21 billion expense base. Could it be EUR 50 million one way or the other? Yes. But for the most part, I'm pretty comfortable that we will not exceed what we have guided because we have clear benefits from productivity showing up along with the pacing that we have. So I would like to just reassure everyone on that one. Look, on SRTs, I'll take you back to the Investor Day and we had said what our ambitions were. That is just one tool in our belt related to capital optimization. We don't want to be over reliant on any one thing. And in fact, we don't want to be overreliant on any one product or platform. The SRTs, Therefore, we are building new platforms and diversifying against counterparties. We -- in this particular quarter, we executed one of the programs. We have some lined up. But at this point, unless we really see a need, we don't think we really have a dependency to massively scale the SRTs, we have much better ways to free up capital, taking portfolio actions where we don't give up economics, things like we've done in India, exiting nonperforming exposures, which free up capital. So I think at this point, we are pretty comfortable with the goal that we had for using SRTs as we laid out at the Investor Day. And at the moment, our ratio benefit is around 75 to 80 basis points. I think we think it's reasonable.

Next question comes from the line of Tom Hallett from KBW.

Firstly, the FIC performance was particularly strong relative to peers. So I'm just wondering, do you think that relative outperformance is sustainable? Because it looks like there was quite a big gain there in the last few days of the quarter. And I'm just curious how the third quarter has started, please? And then secondly, I'm sorry if I've missed it, but when do you plan to start and complete the EUR 500 million buyback? And then I'm just curious in terms of timing for 2027, should we be looking at the second quarter as the time where you will seek to distribute your first half profits again? And then also look to kind of signal to the market there's excess upon approval that we'll do for the second half of the year? I'm just trying to get a better understanding of the timing of future buybacks. And then finally, just could you help size the revenue opportunity for the pension reforms?