The Association of German Private Banks (in German: Der Bundesverband deutscher Banken (BdB)) is the association of commercial banks in Germany and a key lobby group for Germany's financial sector. It was founded in 1951 in Cologne as an Eingetragener Verein, succeeding the pre-war Centralverband des deutschen Bank- und Bankiergewerbes [de] (1901-1945). In 1999 it moved to Berlin, while its the publishing subsidiary Bankverlag remained in Cologne. The association also maintains an office in Brussels.
BdB represents the joint interests of around 210 private commercial banks and 11 member associations.[1][2]
The 11 regional associations are: Bankenverband Baden-Württemberg e.V., Bankenverband Bremen e.V., Bankenverband Hamburg e.V., Bankenverband Hessen e.V., Bankenverband Niedersachsen e.V., Bankenverband Rheinland-Pfalz e.V., Bankenverband Saarland e.V., Bankenverband Schleswig-Holstein e.V., Bankenvereinigung Nordrhein-Westfalen e.V., Bayerischer Bankenverband e.V., and Ostdeutscher Bankenverband e.V. (OstBV) which represents Berlin and the five so-called new states.
Deposit guarantee schemes
The BdB manages two separate but interrelated deposit guarantee schemes.
The BdB's statutory deposit guarantee scheme (German: Entschädigungseinrichtung deutscher Banken, EdB) insures deposits up to the harmonized European limit of €100,000 per account, in line with the EU Deposit Guarantee Scheme Directive (DGSD).[3]
The BdB's additional or "top-up" deposit guarantee fund (German: Einlagensicherungsfonds) provides deposit guarantee in addition to that of the EdB, up to 5 million euro for individuals and 50 million for corporate entities.[4]
In 2021, the collapse of Greensill Capital and its German banking arm resulted in an obligation for the BdB deposit insurance to pay out €2.7 billion to more than 20,000 former customers of the bank.[5] Following that event, the BdB decided to reduce its deposit insurance coverage.[6] The levels are planned to be gradually reduced to reach 1 million for individuals and 10 million for corporate entities by 2030.[7]
Auditing Association
The Auditing Association of German Banks (German: Prüfungsverband deutscher Banken e.V., PdB), established in 1969 in Cologne, is a sister entity to the BdB and is tasked with assessing the risk of each participating BdB member which feeds into the calculation of EdB and ESF deposit guarantee fees. It is led by a 3-members management board.[8]
Leadership
The BdB is led by an executive board or Vorstand.[9] The three large banks (Grossbanken, namely Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, and Hypovereinsbank) each nominate one member; the small privately owned banks (Privatbankiers) collectively have two seats; the second-tier commercial banks known as regional banks (German: Regionalbanken) have four seats; and the foreign banks (other than Italian-owned Hypovereinsbank) have one seat. Ex officio, the General Manager (German: Hauptgeschäftsführer) of the BdB is also a member of the Vorstand.
The board elects a President (German: Präsident) along with two alternates, which together form the Präsidium. By tradition, the President role should be held alternating between the big banks and the other members of private and regional banks, but that rule is not followed strictly.
The daily business is led by the collective Management Board (German: Geschäftsführung), which is led by the General Manager.[10]
From 2016 until 2017, a parliamentary fact-finding committee probed BdB’s potential involvement in tax fraud involving multi-billion-euro trades to get bogus tax reclaims, following the revelations by the CumEx Files; however, the probe proved unable to access emails and documents from BdB. In 2020, public prosecutors on raided the Berlin and Frankfurt offices of BdB as part of a similar investigation.[12]
