DWS Group

DWS was founded in Hamburg in 1956 as "Deutsche Gesellschaft für Wertpapiersparen mbH" , the name was later shortened to DWS, "Die Wertpapier Spezialisten" . Originally, the activities involved products and investment services that were initially offered to investors in Germany and throughout Europe. Activities under the DWS Investments brand were later expanded to include separate line-ups of products and investments services for investors in the USA, Asia and other regions.Originally Deutsche Bank held 30% of DWS while the rest was held by other financial institutions. However by 2004, DWS was wholly owned by Deutsche Bank.In 2009, DWS took control over Rosenberg Real Estate Equity Funds which was also owned by Deutsche Bank.In 2012, Deutsche Bank announced the establishment of its Asset & Wealth Management division which DWS was fully integrated into. The DWS brand name was retained as the name for the German retail business. However in 2015, AWM was split into Deutsche Asset Management and Deutsche Bank Wealth Management.In 2017, Deutsche Asset Management was rebranded to DWS with Deutsche Bank planning to publicly list a minority stake of it.In 2018, DWS was spun off as a separate company through an initial public offering on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. However despite being a separate company, the majority of DWS shares are still held by Deutsche Bank at 79.49%.In October 2018, DWS named Asoka Woehermann as the replacement for former CEO Nicolas Moreau.A DWS annual report in 2020 claimed that half of the company's assets ran through environmental, social and corporate governance criteria. An internal report contradicted this, and stated that only a small amount of the firm's investments applied ESG. As a result of the probe, German regulators began investigating Deutsche Bank president Karl von Rohr's role in the DWS.In 2021, The Wall Street Journal reported that the United States Department of Justice and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission were investigating DWS' claims of sustainable investing.In 2022, Woehermann resigned from his post of CEO after the company’s offices in Frankfurt were raided by police. He was replaced by Stefan Hoops who was previously head of the corporate bank at Deutsche Bank.