Deutsche closing gap on Citi?

Deutsche Bank could be about to close the forex-earnings gap with rival Citigroup, if foreign exchange figures match the 33% dollar-terms improvement in its debt group, announced last week, reports Risk's sister publication FX Week .

The bank will reveal in March the forex contribution to the debt division’s $7.7 billion revenues in 2003, up from $5.8 billion in 2002.

Some of that rise in dollar terms can be attributed to the 20% fall in the value of the US dollar over the 2003 financial year, from $1.0481 per euro at the end of 2002 to $1.2552 the following year. But the precipitous fall of the dollar has also brought with it stellar opportunities for forex trading in major and emerging markets, and could herald an even steeper percentage rise in foreign exchange revenues for Deutsche Bank, which were at US$1,285 million in 2002.

Citigroup’s forex trading revenues, meanwhile, slipped from $1,790 million in 2002 to $1,782 million in 2003.

Gordon Wallace, head of forex trading at Deutsche Bank in London, confirmed that the bank seen increases in foreign exchange revenues during the steepest part of the dollar’s decline in the last quarter of 2003. In common with the US banks, which announced their results last month, Deutsche Bank reported that clients were more active in this period.

And with many hedge funds moving their year-end reporting dates to November, the traditional flurry of activity at the end of the year was spread across both months, said Wallace.