Commerzbank’s Boardroom Surrender Sets the Stage for a High-Stakes Video Call
Published on 07/24/2026 at 19:42 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
Jens Weidmann has dropped the shield. After months of resisting UniCredit’s creeping advance, the Commerzbank chairman is now calling for direct negotiations with Andrea Orcel, effectively conceding that the defence strategy has run its course. The about-face came on Friday, with Weidmann publicly urging the Italian bank’s chief to sit down with Frankfurt management rather than working the political backchannels in Berlin.
The shift in tone is a tacit admission of the arithmetic UniCredit has assembled. Through a combination of share purchases, derivatives and a formal takeover offer, the Milan-based lender has secured effective access to roughly 48 percent of Commerzbank’s equity. “Even if we had wished for a different outcome, the majority situation at the next annual general meeting is clear,” Weidmann said, before delivering a pointed message to Orcel: “Everyone should now behave like adults. These talks are also in UniCredit’s interest, and there will be no shortcut via Berlin.”
The olive branch came just a day after UniCredit published its second-quarter results, which laid bare the mounting cost of the cross-border pursuit. Net profit for the period came in at €2.9 billion, a year-on-year decline of roughly 13 percent. The culprit was a one-off trading and financing charge of €245 million, tied largely to hedging the expanded Commerzbank stake. Strip out that exceptional item, and adjusted earnings would have reached €3.1 billion.
Orcel, however, remains undeterred. He raised UniCredit’s full-year net profit guidance to well above €11 billion, and to roughly €11.5 billion before integration costs. The Commerzbank investment, he insists, should deliver a return on capital of around 15 percent. Yet the takeover ambitions are already squeezing UniCredit’s own shareholders: Orcel signalled that a planned €4.75 billion share buyback for 2025 could be scrapped if the acquisition is consolidated, as the bank wants to keep its core capital ratio at 13 percent of assets. The prospect did not go down well in Milan, where UniCredit shares slid 3.6 percent.
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Orcel is also turning up the heat on timing. He wants Commerzbank to adopt UniCredit’s blueprint from January — a strategy that would sharply scale back the German lender’s international network and refocus it on the domestic market and Poland. If Frankfurt resists, Orcel warned analysts that he could convene an extraordinary general meeting and install a new management board. “We are in a position to call an extraordinary general meeting and exercise control,” he said, though he stressed this would be a last resort if all parties are not pulling in the same direction by 1 January.
Berlin has pushed back. Commerzbank, its works council and even the finance ministry have all told Orcel to direct his overtures to chief executive Bettina Orlopp rather than trying to negotiate through political channels. That message appears to have landed: Orcel and Orlopp are now planning a video call shortly after Commerzbank publishes its own quarterly results on 6 August. Nobody expects a breakthrough from that single conversation, but it could open the door to more substantive talks.
The market, for now, is betting on dialogue rather than confrontation. Commerzbank shares rose 1.29 percent on Friday to €36.81, leaving them roughly 6 percent below the 52-week high of €39.18 touched on 14 July. On a year-to-date basis, the stock has gained nearly 23 percent — a sign that investors have been pricing in takeover speculation for some time.
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The next fortnight will be pivotal. Commerzbank’s own numbers on 6 August will determine how much leverage Orlopp carries into the video call with Orcel. Until then, the cross-currents from Milan, Frankfurt and Berlin are likely to keep the shares churning.
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