DWS sees record profits amid stable AUM

DWS kept assets under management stable at €833bn last quarter, despite the challenging market environment, while seeing the firm's highest ever pre-tax profit in the first nine months of the year.

In the firm's Q3 results, DWS said that the high profits were due to steeper management fees and continued demand for high-margin alternatives, which saw €1bn in inflows last quarter.

Profits before tax of €252m in Q3, which was down 7% year-on-year, but still high enough to push profits before tax to €804m in the first nine months of 2022, up 5% year on year and the highest on record for the firm.

Q3 also saw a return to net inflows for the firm, at €7.7bn. However, DWS has still seen net outflows of €18.3bn throughout 2022.

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Outflows reached €7bn in active funds in Q3, up from €1.5bn in Q2, and were primarily driven by the €4.1bn in outflows in fixed income funds.

Passive funds also saw significant outflows at €3.8bn, with DWS stating that this was due to clients wanting to de-risk their portfolios "given the prevailing expectation of a recession and falling share prices".

Meanwhile, low-margin cash products saw a sharp turnaround in inflows, going from €24.8bn in outflows in Q2 to €17.6bn in inflows last quarter.

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The firm said: "Market developments had a negative impact on our assets under management, but especially favourable exchange rate movements and net inflows compensated for this."

DWS also noted that it had made many significant hires during the third quarter, such as Karen Kuder as chief administrative officer and Angela Maragkopoulou as chief operating officer. Most recently, DWS said this month that Dirk Goergen would be appointed Americas CEO from the start of 2023.

Furthermore, the firm said that it would be changing the firm's current Group Sustainability Council into a Committee of the Executive Board, while also setting up both a Sustainability Oversight Office within its Chief Financial Office division and a Sustainability Strategy team as part of the Corporate Strategy team.