NEW YORK: They've already bought up Random House, Chrysler and even Rolls
Royce this year. And now the world's biggest bank is no longer American or Swiss
but German, following the announcement Monday that Deutsche Bank AG
would officially gobble up BankersTrust for $10.1 billion. Is Germany
trying to take over the world? TIME Brussels bureau chief James Graff says
the country still has a lot of catching up to do.
"German firms have long been woefully under-represented in cross-border
holdings," he says. "But thanks to the German stock market, these companies
have a lot of money to spend." German banks were raised on
low-excitement commercial loans -- now they want a piece of the sexy
securities loot, and that's where BankersTrust came in. It's not world
domination, it's just the global economy.
