The steward sounds worried: "We still need soap bubbles," she calls out before the photographers and cameramen can get started.

And there will also be a “sound effect”, as she says.

The small Frankfurt protest group, which calls itself the Koala Collective, went to great lengths to stage their criticism of Deutsche Bank at its general meeting: they collected twelve old washing machines from material yards and carted them in front of the bank's twin towers on Taunusanlage .

They draped green textiles around it, poured a black, oil-like liquid onto it and also scattered a bit of coal dust.

And for those who cannot interpret the still life, they have also set up a large black sign: "Greenwashing kills - get out of coal, oil and gas".

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Falk Heunemann

Business editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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Critics have to come up with something to attract attention with their objections to Deutsche Bank.

Not only because Germany's largest bank has already experienced many forms of protest: A year ago, a climate protection organization had a balloon in the shape of a globe rise, others burned down a replica bank logo.

And once a cake was baked with an icing of Africa on it, which was then dramatically cut;

the brown chocolate pieces were obviously about hunger and land grabs.

The Koala collective also knows that camera crews are unlikely to come here for banners or whistles.

Sewing pronounces “sustainable” 15 times

However, it is also not so easy to attract attention because the Annual General Meeting will again only be held as a digital live stream.

Not even the entire supervisory board fits into the small studio.

Shareholders are once again unable to step up to a microphone in front of the assembled team and call out their opinion directly to the bank's board of directors.

Instead, they had to submit questions in writing beforehand.

A few shareholders have at least shot small videos, either in front of virtual backgrounds, the home showcase wall with a model airplane or in the Australian outback.

There, indigenous people in traditional livery have been occupying a dusty piece of land for more than 200 days that they regard as sacred ground, but which is now to be developed by a mining company allegedly financed by Deutsche Bank.

If the managers in Frankfurt should move the protest notes, they don't let it show.

In his last speech as Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Paul Achleitner said that the topic of sustainability had "gained considerably in importance" during his term of office.

And bank boss Christian Sewing even emphasizes that the financial institution sees sustainability as a growth market, which is why Deutsche Bank has set itself “ambitious sustainability goals” and linked the remuneration of the board of directors to them.

After all, the word "sustainable" appears 15 times in Sewing's speech to the shareholders, more often than "return", "profit" or "employees".

Shareholders, who then have their say virtually live for several hours, seem to be of little interest, they prefer to talk about the remuneration of the board of directors, fintechs as a target group of the future, or ask how they feel about the outgoing chairman of the supervisory board after all the years of criticism and debate can now send a few gifts.

And they are happy that after a two-year Corona break, there should be a dividend again, 20 cents per share.

Because of the profit distribution, the good business figures and the farewell mood for Achleitner, only a few shareholders see a reason for critical allegations.

New builder via video

The climate debate has long been part of the rules of procedure.

The climate activist Luisa Neubauer is allowed to comment via video at lunchtime and say that she does not take away Sewing's interest in ecology: "Sustainable does not mean that you pick a few green projects and otherwise do business as usual," she explains in her video message while a megaphone dangles from the wall behind.

The Board of Management must hear and answer your question as to when the bank will stop financing fossil fuel projects at the Annual General Meeting.

Obviously, Neubauer is a shareholder and, like everyone else, has a right to it. Deutsche Bank also takes climate change seriously, counters Sewing.

But he is against excluding entire sectors from the financing.

The koala collective in front of the twin towers has no right to be heard by the board.

Have you seen their washing machines in the bank?

"People have taken note of it," believes one of the activists.

All the same, the bank lets them do as they please – as long as the activists bring the twelve washing machines back to the material yards in the evening.

The climate activists will then have to come up with a new motif for the bank's general meeting next year.