Morgan Grenfell

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Morgan Grenfell was an investment bank in London .

history

The bank was founded in 1838 by George Peabody as a subsidiary of what would later become JP Morgan . In 1864 the company passed to the Morgan family. When Edward Grenfell joined in 1904, the bank changed its name to Morgan, Grenfell & Co. In the 1920s, in particular, the bank managed to position itself as a successful and important investment bank in Europe. In 1933 JP Morgan sold a third of the shares and withdrew completely as a partner in 1982. In the wake of an insider scandal in which Morgan Grenfell advised Guinness on the takeover of Destillers Company, John Craven joined the bank as chairman and became a shareholder with a stake of just under 5% by bringing in his own investment company Phoenix Securities .

Takeover by Deutsche Bank

In 1984, Deutsche Bank acquired a 4.99% stake in Morgan Grenfell as the basis for a cooperation. At the same time, the French Banque Indosuez was a shareholder with a share of 14.9%. When it was feared that Indosuez would take over the majority, the management turned to Deutsche Bank in search of a “white knight”. Deutsche Bank saw the opportunity to improve its access to the investment banking market. During the acquisition phase , Alfred Herrhausen stated: "What we admire and do not own is the Anglo-Saxon culture in the money business." On the day of Herrhausen's murder, November 30, 1989, Hilmar Kopper signed the purchase of the decisive shares in Indosuez. The total purchase price was £ 950 million (DM 2.7 billion). Before the end of the year, Deutsche Bank had secured the majority of the shares.

The bank initially remained organizationally independent and John Craven became the first international director of Deutsche Bank. For the cooperation with the newer parent company, considerable problems arose from the different corporate culture . The decision-making paths and deadlines in investment banking are considerably shorter than we were used to at Deutsche Bank. After a stronger integration and the renaming of the bank in Deutsche Morgan Grenfell, Craven left the company. Morgan Grenfell received negative headlines when a young fund manager generated heavy losses through speculation. With the help of Deutsche Bank, the fund investors had to be paid out again.

Because Morgan Grenfell's business was not progressing to the desired extent - on the contrary, the bank lost important personalities - Deutsche Bank decided to take an unusual step in 1995 on the recommendation of Michael Dobson, Craven's successor. Merrill Lynch recruited Edson Mitchell , one of the stars of the industry. He brought a large team of more than 40 experienced investment bankers with him and massively expanded the business in a short time. A second center of power emerged at Deutsche Bank in London. Due to conflicts and complex responsibilities, Mitchell wanted to leave the bank soon after. However, Josef Ackermann , who had only recently been with the bank and had experience in investment banking, managed to prevent this by making concessions to London's independence.

After the acquisition of Bankers Trust in the USA by Deutsche Bank in 1998, in which the employees of Morgan Grenfell played a key role, the entire investment banking division of Deutsche Bank was reorganized and substantial parts of Morgan Grenfell were brought into the new organization . The business area has been operating in the market since 1999 as "Deutsche Asset Management". The decision-makers are still in London after the sudden death of Mitchell, who had just moved up to the board of Deutsche Bank, in a plane crash in 2000. After the reorganization, the Morgan Grenfell only exists as a coat.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kathleen Burk, Morgan Grenfell 1838-1988: The Biography of a Merchant Bank, Clarendon Press, 1989
  2. ↑ MORGAN GRENFELL Survives A BRITISH SCANDAL , New York Times of May 24, 1987
  3. ↑ Heinz E. Büschgen: The Deutsche Bank from 1957 to the present, in: Die Deutsche Bank 1870-1995, Beck, Munich 1995, 849-851
  4. ↑ quoted from Büschgen, 251
  5. ^ Germans to Buy Morgan Grenfell New York Times, November 28, 1989
  6. ↑ Case study ( Memento of the original from March 18, 2006 in the web archive archive.today ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.erisk.com
  7. ^ Morgan Grenfell bites the dust BBC News, June 4, 1999
  8. ↑ Mitchell as an integrating figure difficult to replace , Manager Magazin, December 27, 2000