Scholz Says Deutsche Bank ‘Profitable,’ No Need for Concern

(Bloomberg) -- German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said there’s no reason for concern about Deutsche Bank AG after worries about the broader European banking sector sent the lender’s shares tumbling by the most in three years.

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“Deutsche Bank has fundamentally modernized and reorganized its business model and is a very profitable bank,” Scholz said Friday at a news conference in Brussels when asked about the lender’s situation.

“There is no need to worry about anything,” he added. The German leader — who was finance minister under his predecessor Angela Merkel — was speaking after talks with European Union counterparts and European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde in the Belgian capital.

Deutsche Bank fell 6.7% as of 4:59 p.m. in Frankfurt, after earlier declining as much as 15%. The stock is down about 18% this year.

The rout came despite hopes that the government-brokered rescue of Credit Suisse Group AG last weekend would stabilize Europe’s finance sector.

Regulators and executives have sought to reassure traders about the banking industry’s health with central banks maintaining their focus on inflation amid hopes that the worst of the financial turmoil is past.

Scholz also sought to calm market nerves, saying that banking oversight in Europe is “robust and stable.”

“For many years now, we have taken very correct decisions with regard to the stability of our banks in Europe,” Scholz said.

These had been “faster and clearer than in many other countries of the world,” he said, adding that the EU and the euro region “are quite far ahead when it comes to having clear rules.”

(Updates shares in the fourth paragraph.)

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