After more than four years, the financial supervisory authority BaFin has criticized an error in Deutsche Bank's 2019 annual financial statements.

The Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) stated on Tuesday that the bank had not sufficiently explained in the notes how and why it intended to return to profit in the USA after a series of losses in subsequent years. In its opinion, however, this would have been necessary because the bank had accumulated tax credits (deferred taxes) of almost 2.08 billion euros, from which it could only benefit if these were offset against tax charges from future profits in the USA.

The error was discovered during a spot check by the auditors of the German Financial Reporting Enforcement Panel (FREP), whose tasks were taken over by BaFin in 2022. It has no consequences for Deutsche Bank: "BaFin does not indicate that Deutsche Bank's 2019 annual financial statements are incorrect and no adjustments or other measures are required," said a spokesperson for the bank. The bank remains of the opinion that its 2019 financial statements complied with the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).

(Report by Alexander Hübner, edited by Ralf Banser. If you have any queries, please contact our editorial team at berlin.newsroom@thomsonreuters.com (for politics and the economy) or frankfurt.newsroom@thomsonreuters.com (for companies and markets).)