Following a series of tender offers, Deutsche Bank acquired and merged with Postbank AG in 2020. Shareholder suits alleging the takeover price was insufficient were initiated even prior to the merger. Deutsche Bank announced in late August that it has settled with 80 plaintiffs, representing 60% of the overall claim amount.
Deutsche Bank AG took over the majority of Postbank AG by means of public tender offers between 2010 and 2012. After some back and forth, the banks fully merged in 2020, with the Postbank brand still continuing to exist but as a mere branch of Deutsche Bank AG. As early as 2010, after the first offer, first shareholders filed claims against Deutsche Bank, arguing that the takeover offer price should have been significantly higher than the EUR 25 per share Deutsche Bank had agreed to pay. Most plaintiffs demanded an additional payment of EUR 32.25 per share (plus legal interest).
The plaintiffs’ damages claims are not aggregated in a collective proceeding, such as the KapMuG, but exist as individual lawsuits. Individual cases having been litigated up to the Federal Court of Justice and back to the lower instances in the meantime. But so far, no final positive judgment has been rendered.
Deutsche Bank announced in August that it has settled pending claims with a group of 80 plaintiffs, representing 60% of the amounts claimed in total, and agreed to pay plaintiffs an additional EUR 31 per share, excluding interest. The largest individual claimant in the settlement was Elliott Investment Management, who received a payment of EUR 200 million. Those claims were all still pending in 1st instance.
19 of those plaintiffs participating in the settlement, who were grouped in two claims, totalling an original claim amount of EUR 4.5 million, were funded by German third party funder Foris AG, according to a press release Foris issued.
Following the announcement, Deutsche Bank released EUR 430 million from the EUR 1.3 billion in provisions made for the Postbank takeover litigation from its balance sheet, which it had recorded after the Cologne Court of Appeal had recently indicated that it might side with plaintiffs.
Deutsche Bank announced in early September that, in one separate case at the appellate level, it even agreed to an additional payment of EUR 36.50 per share, plus legal costs, totalling EUR 8.8 million. Effecten-Spiegel, the plaintiff, and Deutsche Bank commented that this was based on peculiarities of the individual case. Effecten-Spiegel had been the first plaintiff in this case, having sued initially back in 2010, and was the only active plaintiff for years. Observers believe Deutsche Bank also wished to avoid a potentially negative decision at the Cologne Court of Appeal, which would have been due on 24 October. As of this point in time, a parallel case at the Cologne Court of Appeal, scheduled for a decision on the same date, has not been settled.
We will keep monitoring the case and share significant developments in future issues.
