The tone of the "media information" from the fund company DWS is kept extremely friendly, but the content reveals the circumstances relentlessly.

"Stefan Kreuzkamp had agreed to the company's request to prematurely terminate his contract, which ran until the beginning of 2024, to make room for the new management team," it says at the beginning of the fourth paragraph.

Before that, the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of DWS, Karl von Rohr, expresses his gratitude and "regrets about his departure". The Chairman of the Board of Management, Stefan Hoops, says that he has known Kreuzkamp for more than ten years, has come to appreciate him as a colleague and partner and appreciates his commitment and his sense of responsibility "also personally very grateful".

Hanno Mussler

Editor in Business.

  • Follow I follow

But it doesn't help, it becomes clear in the fourth paragraph at the latest, the 56-year-old Kreuzkamp is one too many in the management of DWS.

At the end of September, the listed fund company distributed investment business tasks to several shoulders.

One beneficiary of the restructuring was Björn Jesch, who returned to DWS in the summer of 2020 after positions at Union Investment and Credit Suisse and took over the role of Kreuzkamp’s global investment manager (CIO) there in September 2022.

It was said in September that he remained head of the investment division, "but Jesch should become more of the face of DWS in public," wrote the FAZ even then.

Position will not be filled

Now the reorganization, which is said to have been initiated by Kreuzkamp himself, finally turns out to be to his disadvantage.

Kreuzkamp's contract, which expires at the beginning of 2024 and would have been due for an extension in 2023, will be canceled prematurely "by mutual agreement".

His position will not be filled again.

In addition to Jesch, Fiona Bassett and Vincenzo Vedda, who were promoted to important positions in September, will also report directly to Hoops in the future.

In June, he replaced Asoka Wöhrmann, who had had to go after allegations that DWS had exaggerated the progress made in sustainability (“greenwashing”).

Since then, the new leadership has been trying to bring stability to DWS.

Two new managing directors, Angela Maragkopoulou and Karen Kuder, were appointed in August.

With the early departure of Kreuzkamp, ​​the year 2023 should now begin unencumbered by the changes that are emerging.

After all, Kreuzkamp worked for DWS for 24 years, initially as a portfolio manager for money market funds, then he headed the bond and money market fund business until he was given the role of Global Investment Strategist (CIO) and Head of the Investment Division in 2018.

This made the reserved Kreuzkamp the face of DWS in public.