“Our customers stand to benefit from an even wider and more powerful range of products and services offered by the future new Commerzbank. The bank continues to endorse its tried and tested customer-oriented business model. Our goal is to establish Commerzbank as one of the leading banks at the heart of Europe.”
Commerzbank has placed a strong emphasis on focused growth, while at the same time controlling costs in order to improve shareholder return. Organic growth is the target across all divisions. The ‘future through growth’ programme in the private banking and business customers division aimed to gain 800,000 new clients by 2009. The target will have been achieved by the end of this year.
Impressive growth has also been achieved at the bank’s Polish subsidiary, BRE Bank, which now has two million retail customers, up from 600,000 in 2006. Targeted growth in fee-earning business rose by 8% last year to €3.15bn, while the dividend was increased from 75 cents to €1 per share, the fourth consecutive year of dividend growth.
Through customer initiatives in the retail sector, Commerzbank has been able to achieve significant growth by winning over new customers from the German savings banks. Coupled with its ‘branch of the future’ concept, the bank is offering new products to its customers, and thanks to this effort, customer satisfaction has risen to 90%, according to surveys.
