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Commerzbank AG has suddenly changed tack.
Germany's second-largest bank announced May 23 that it had finished integrating its ship financing business with the proud name Deutsche Schiffsbank AG. Pfandbrief emission was the next step.
Now, just a month later, Commerzbank has stated it will wind down both its commercial real estate financing and its ship finance business. A core segment is to close for business.
"The new core bank segment real estate and ship finance will not be launched as had originally been planned," the bank's press release admitted, pointing to the "high capital and the rising liquidity requirements under Basel III, and especially for long-term financing, as well as the strong cyclical fluctuations, which are to be expected in the result in the future."
Martin Blessing explained in the bank's intranet, according to Handelsblatt: "This is no volte-face but an acceleration of our previous course. ... A rapid end to the euro crisis is not in sight. Therefore we must continue to reduce risks in a disciplined manner and concentrate on the business, which offers long-term profits."
If not a volte-face, the change is certainly extremely hasty. It has caused outside observers to question the bank's direction.
Asking whether the bank was "in peril at sea," Handelsblatt chose the headline: "Full steam reverse: Captain Blessing changes course."
Stefan Bongardt, a bank analyst at Independent Research, noted to SNL Financial that this was "perhaps the third restructuring" in recent times and there were now few "parameters to sell...