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Germany: Politicians split over Deutsche Bank merger

By  |  March 21, 2019

A political rift has emerged in Berlin over whether Germany should put its financial muscle behind a merger of Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank, politicians and officials said, complicating a bid to create Europe’s third-largest bank and fund it.

Germany’s two top banks have struggled to recover since the financial crisis and government officials, led by Finance Minister Olaf Scholz, are pushing for a merger to create a national banking champion and end questions over their future.

But a dispute is unfolding between the two political parties who govern Germany in coalition, a row that could reduce political momentum for a deal and derail any future agreement on whether or how Berlin should financially underpin a merged group.

One senior German official said that Scholz, a Social Democrat, had “gone it alone” in pushing for the deal without first securing the backing of Christian Democrats (CDU) in the coalition.

Full Content: Reuters

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