Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE:DB) saw its shares jump 5.6% in premarket trading Thursday after the German lender unveiled stronger-than-anticipated Q4 profit. Moreover, the bank also further raised shareholder returns and announced 3,500 job cuts.
The bank revealed a net profit of 1.3 billion EUR for the fourth quarter, down 30% year-over-year, but above the consensus estimates of 785.61 million EUR. Net revenue came in at 6.7 billion EUR, up 5% from the year-ago quarter, and missing Wall Street’s projection.
Further, Deutsche Bank revealed an increase in its share buybacks and dividends by 50%, committing to a total shareholder return of 1.6 billion EUR. The bank intends to execute an extra share repurchase worth 675 million EUR within the first half of 2024.
The bank now anticipates to reach 2025 revenue target of 32 billion EUR by 2025.
“At face value, this implies a 37% upgrade to 2025 consensus PBT, although we expect the market to question the upbeat revenue guidance,” analysts at Morgan Stanley said in a note.
Meanwhile, the lender intends to propose 900 million EUR in shareholder dividends for the year 2023 at the Annual General Meeting scheduled for May.
At the same time, Deutsche said it will cut 3,500 jobs as part of its 2.5 billion EUR operational efficiency program. The layoffs will mainly affect “non-client-facing areas.”