Berenberg’s Leadership Restructure Signals Strategic Shift in European Investment Banking

The promotion of Bastian Schiedat signals Berenberg’s intent to strengthen its foothold in continental European investment banking amid shifting market dynamics. Schiedat—a 15-year veteran and co-head of syndicate—will now oversee Germany, Austria, Switzerland (“DACH” region), France & Benelux, and strategic advisory. This elevates governance and aligns those regional businesses under a singular leader to improve cohesion and cross-selling potential. This likely addresses prior fragmentation in decision-making between regionally divided heads, accelerating deal execution and capital markets activity across borders.

The December 2025 restructuring created two discrete business units: one for investment banking, now under Laura Janssens (also elevated to the management board), and another for Corporate, Wealth & Asset Management led by Frederik Gottlob. Splitting these allows for sharper focus, tailored resource allocation, and clearer accountability on growth and risk. The investment banking unit (≈400 employees) can now deploy Schiedat’s mandate to monetize client relationships and syndicate flows across continental Europe with fewer internal frictions. Meanwhile, the new Corporate, Wealth & Asset Management unit can deepen its products without the distraction of investment banking’s volatility.

Complementing this internal structure, Berenberg appears doubling down across its continental Europe markets while also maintaining a strong UK presence. Despite challenges—such as low volumes in UK IPOs, regulatory cost pressures, and consolidations among brokers—Berenberg has shown 20-30% growth in investment banking revenue (e.g. ca. €300m in 2024) and is continuing to invest in London strongly. In this context, appointing Schiedat gives leadership continuity and a well-known internal figure to push into Europe’s weaker capital markets, where opportunity may exist in M&A, ECM, DCM, and strategic advisory.

Strategic implications include: (a) greater opportunity for cross-border dealmaking and consolidation of client coverage; (b) enhanced ability to compete with both boutique advisory firms and large bulge bracket banks in continental Europe; (c) potential cost investments in syndicate, advisory, and ECM infrastructure in continental hubs; (d) monitoring of performance metrics to ensure that the investment banking unit’s revenue streams justify the overhead of the restructuring; and (e) how Berenberg manages tensions between UK and continental business lines, especially as UK capital markets remain under pressure.

Open questions include: How will Schiedat’s performance be measured—by revenue, deal count, profitability, or some composite? What investment will be made to support his mandate, such as hiring across regions or increasing partnership with capital markets desks? How does currency risk, regulatory divergence, and differing tax/market structures across Europe impact this continental consolidation? What is the revenue split expected between UK vs continental Europe going forward? And how will this position Berenberg relative to competitors expanding in Europe (e.g. global banks pulling back, boutiques expanding)?”