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A former senior banker at Deutsche Bank is suing his ex-employer for €152mn in damages for alleged harm caused to his career by criminal proceedings relating to an accounting scandal at Italian bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena.
Deutsche’s former head of institutional clients Dario Schiraldi is demanding compensation from the German lender in a civil lawsuit filed in Frankfurt District Court for “alleged harm caused to his career by the Italian criminal proceedings and conviction at first instance”.
Although the legal case was filed last year, it only came to light on Thursday when Deutsche disclosed the existence of a €152mn claim against the bank in its annual report.
The German lender did not name Schiraldi in the report, but the Frankfurt court on Friday confirmed that it had received a lawsuit from him and had not yet set a date for a hearing. Italian newspaper Milano Finanza first reported the identity of the claimant.
Schiraldi’s lawsuit is the latest twist in a long-running accounting scandal at what was then Italy’s third-largest lender.
In 2008, Monte dei Paschi di Siena entered complex derivatives deals with Deutsche and others. Italian criminal prosecutors later alleged that the transactions were designed to conceal losses from investors and accused Deutsche and its employees of aiding and abetting false accounting and market manipulation.
Schiraldi and five other bankers employed by Deutsche at the time of the trades were convicted by a Milanese court in November 2019 and sentenced to jail, although no time was ever served as the convictions were overturned on appeal.
The lengthy legal process took years longer to run its course, however, and it was not until last year that the Italian financial regulator withdrew its final appeal related to the case.
Schiraldi, who is now based in Dubai, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A spokesperson for the Frankfurt court told the Financial Times that a hearing was likely to be scheduled soon, as a deadline for Deutsche to file a written statement to the court was due to expire shortly, but declined to comment on the detailed nature of Schiraldi’s claims.
As well as the claim from Schiraldi, Deutsche disclosed on Thursday that it had been threatened with similar litigation by five other former employees in the English courts, although no other claims have yet been filed.
Former Deutsche executive Michele Faissola, who was among the bankers whose conviction was overturned by the Italian courts on appeal, declined to comment.
Deutsche Bank declined to comment.
In its annual report, Deutsche stated that “all such claims” were “entirely without merit, describing Schiraldi’s alleged losses as “inflated and unrealistic”. It said that it would not disclose any provisions relating to the case because to do so would “prejudice seriously” the outcome of the matter.
