Cooperative bank: DZ Bank surprises with record profit

Surprising record profit: The cooperative DZ Bank Group exceeded the previous year's record figures in 2024, despite significantly increased provisions for possible setbacks. Pre-tax profit rose from around 3.2 billion euros to just over 3.3 billion euros, and profit increased by seven percent to 2.39 billion euros.

"Our diversified business model has proven to be particularly robust in this difficult environment," said DZ Bank CEO Cornelius Riese in Frankfurt. At the end of August, Riese had forecast a pre-tax profit in a significantly lower range of EUR 2.0 billion to EUR 2.5 billion based on the group's half-year figures.

The fact that the annual result was significantly better is largely due to the positive development at the fund provider Union Investment and at R+V Versicherung:

• Union Investment recently reported the second-best new business with private customers in the company's history. This also pushed up the DZ Bank Group's net commission income to EUR 3.19 billion.
• R+V benefited from increases in the value of investments and a comparatively moderate development of claims.
• The Schwäbisch Hall building society was also able to more than triple its pre-tax profit to 64 million euros, although demand for new building society contracts is still sluggish.

However, the difficult economic environment forced the Group to significantly increase its risk provisions for possible loan defaults from EUR 362 million to EUR 845 million within a year.

Despite the rather gloomy outlook for the German economy, the group sees good business opportunities. In the first few weeks of the new year, there was "continued brisk demand," said CEO Riese. "In view of the general conditions, we expect a pre-tax profit of 2.5 to 3.0 billion euros for the DZ Bank Group in the 2025 financial year."

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