DWS sees alternatives drive profits as Deutsche Bank posts “record” results
DWS, Deutsche Bank’s asset management division, highlighted that alternative investments were a major contributor to third-quarter profit growth, with these assets driving a more than threefold increase in performance fees compared with the previous year.
According to the German investment bank’s third-quarter 2025 report, DWS’s net revenues for the first nine months of 2025 were up 13 per cent year on year to €2.2bn (£1.9bn). This reflected five per cent growth in management fees to €1.9bn, a more-than-threefold rise in performance and transaction fees to €145m, and a 74 per cent increase in other revenues to €120m.
In the third quarter alone, performance and transaction fees totalled €50m, mainly driven by performance fees from alternative investments, which include infrastructure, real estate, private credit strategies, according to Deutsche Bank.
These performance and transaction fees increases supported an overall 48 per cent year-on-year increase in profit before tax, rising to €666m (£586.6m) at the asset management arm.
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DWS also reported third-quarter net inflows of €12bn, driven predominantly by €10bn of further inflows into passive products, in line with its strategic focus.
Within Deutsche Bank’s private markets lending and structured finance platform, the bank highlighted several transactions in sustainable and infrastructure-related credit, including a €600m senior secured financing for Sweden’s EcoDataCenter and Battery Energy Storage System financings globally for companies such as the UK’s Fidra Energy and Akaysha Energy.
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For the wider group, Deutsche Bank reported a pre-tax profit of €2.4bn for the third quarter, a record for the period and up eight per cent on the same quarter of 2024.
“We delivered record profits in both the third quarter and the first nine months of 2025, demonstrating the value to clients and shareholders of our Global Hausbank in a fast-changing environment,” said Christian Sewing, chief executive officer of Deutsche Bank. “We are on track to deliver on our 2025 financial targets and, having increased shareholder distributions by 50 per cent in each of the last three years, we are on course to return over €8bn to shareholders from 2022 to 2026.”
Net profit attributable to shareholders rose seven per cent to around €1.6bn, driven by higher revenues, stable costs and lower provisions for bad loans. The profit growth reflected a seven per cent year-on-year increase in net revenues, with nine-month revenues reaching €24.4bn.
Read more: DWS launches capital solutions arm in alternative credit push
