The tariff war announced by Donald Trump has caused tremors on the global financial markets, and has also marked a memorable period for the online broker Comdirect. Monday 7 April was the busiest trading day in Comdirect’s history, says Sabine Schoon-Renné, the Commerzbank executive responsible for the direct bank, in an interview with Börsen-Zeitung.

Comdirect was founded in 1994 as a subsidiary of Commerzbank, and has continued as a brand of the banking group since being integrated in November 2020.

The force of the US president’s announcement took many by surprise, and Schoon-Renné was no exception. She notes that public statements made by Trump cause significant activity in the markets and brokerage business, with customers selling off securities or seizing opportunities to buy. The back-and-forth in Trump’s tariff policies – including a 90-day reprieve for most countries, and the announcement of new tariff exemptions while simultaneously toughening the stance on China – indicates continued turbulence. „2025 will remain marked by volatility in the markets“, says Schoon-Renné.

The turmoil in early April also caught neobrokers like Trade Republic and Scalable off guard. These platforms were unable to handle the surge in customers looking to rebalance portfolios, cut losses, or take profits. BaFin is looking into the incidents. Comdirect, however, managed the situation better, according to Schoon-Renné: „Our customers were able to log in and trade at all times. The only minor delay experienced by some customers was in the order book display. But all orders were executed.“

Recent events have led customers to reconsider their investment choices. „At the moment, we’re seeing a trend toward European and German equities," she says. "The reallocation is noticeable. Many have sold off US tech stocks – both to take profits and due to stop-loss limits.“

She also recalls shifts in asset allocation with the European Central Bank’s tighter monetary policy beginning in 2022. As interest rates turned positive again, many sought safe investment products. „Unfortunately, Germany still isn’t a nation of equity investors“, concludes Schoon-Renné. „There’s a strong preference for safety.“

Comdirect's managed assets – including deposits and securities – amounted to 144 billion euros at the end of 2024, a growth of around 20% compared to 2023. The robo-advisor Cominvest accounts for 1.4 billion euros of that. Over 70% of total assets under management are in securities, meaning Comdirect clients hold significantly more securities than the general population.

This contributes substantially to high commission income. But net interest income has also improved significantly thanks to increased deposits, after playing only a minor role for years. Schoon-Renné did not disclose specific earnings figures for Comdirect, which has been fully integrated into Commerzbank. However, Commerzbank’s private and business customers division (which includes Comdirect) reported 6.1 billion euros in revenues (before risk provisions) and nearly 2 billion euros in operating profit in 2024.

The upcoming mid-2025 ban on Payment for Order Flow (PFOF) – fees brokers receive for routing orders to specific trading venues – doesn’t worry her. „We are significantly less affected than initially thought,“ she states.

The details of the implementation are still being worked out. Comdirect’s guiding principle is to continue offering customers a choice of trading venues. „Then we’ll explore different models for handling the PFOF ban. But it’s too early to say exactly what our solution will look like.“

According to Schoon-Renné, Comdirect currently has around 3 million customers, representing nearly one in four of Commerzbank’s 11 million private and business customers in Germany. Customer growth has thus lagged behind competitors. In its last financial statement before being fully acquired by Commerzbank in 2019, Comdirect reported 2.7 million customers.

By comparison, Trade Republic, active in 17 European countries, doubled its customer base to 8 million last year, managing 100 billion euros in customer assets. DKB grew from 4.7 million customers in 2020 to 5.8 million in the past year.

Still, Schoon-Renné emphasises that the focus is not on the absolute number of customers but on profitable growth. „We don’t want to focus solely on customer numbers.“ Based on assets under management, the strategy appears to be working: customer assets have increased significantly since 2019, from 80 billion to 144 billion euros.

Schoon-Renné identifies two main strategic pillars for the bank. „On one hand, we are a digital primary bank offering daily banking – everything that has to do with accounts, cards, and deposits. On the other hand, we are an online broker, serving beginners to professionals.“ She stresses, however that "securities are our DNA.“

About 70% of current account holders considered Comdirect their main bank, with regular deposits into their accounts and usage of several banking services. Schoon-Renné is pleased with the rate, as direct banks are often seen only as secondary accounts.

Comdirect offers three current account models, one of which is conditionally free, if at least 700 euros are deposited monthly. Comdirect will stick to the conditional model, says Schoon-Renné, even though Commerzbank is moving away from it. The latter is discontinuing its comparable offer as of May 1. „We deliberately decided within the group to differentiate ourselves from Commerzbank in this area. It makes clearer who stands for what.“

Even though pure customer growth isn't the main focus, Comdirect – like many other institutions – is increasingly targeting Gen Z. „At the moment, we are gaining many customers aged 30 and over. But in the future, we want to grow more strongly among younger age groups as well“, notes Schoon-Renné.

Marketing activities have been adjusted accordingly: rappers and other influencers vie for the attention of 15- to 30-year-olds on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. „We’re looking at how we can present the brand more freshly through social media“. explains the Comdirect manager. „We’re trying to bring a little more ease into the topic of finance.“

Passing on knowledge and competence in financial matters is a particular concern for her in this context. „Financial education is still underdeveloped in Germany, and this is one of the levers we’re using. It resonates with the very young target group.“ Schoon-Renné says she would like to see schools teach how to manage money wisely. „That is crucial for our country and cannot be compensated for by the private sector“, she says.

She has noticed that many young people are constantly worried about not having enough money in retirement. This concern is much more pronounced in this generation than in previous ones, observes Schoon-Renné. One sign of this growing awareness is the increasing number of young people opening securities accounts in order to invest with a long-term perspective.

Sabine Schoon-Renné (born in 1980) has spent her entire professional career at Commerzbank Group, moving between retail and corporate banking as well as the Commerzbank and Comdirect brands. After training at the bank and completing her bachelor's and master’s degrees in banking at the Frankfurt School, she initially joined the private customer segment of the bank, then moved to corporate banking in 2006.

This was followed by a stint as executive assistant to the Credit Risk Officer, after which she returned to corporate banking. From 2013 to 2015, she led the corporate clients division.

She first got to know her current workplace, Comdirect, in 2016, when it was still an independent bank. There, she was head of Corporate Strategy & Consulting and played a key role in the merger of Comdirect into Commerzbank, which was completed in November 2020. After leading the corporate client strategy, she took over responsibility for Comdirect as the division head in January 2023. Schoon-Renné is married and lives in Hamburg with her husband.