Hannelore Foerster/Bloomberg NewsJosef Ackermann, chief of Deutsche Bank.
FRANKFURT — Josef Ackermann unexpectedly canceled plans to assume the chairmanship of Deutsche Bank when he retires as chief executive in May, possibly heralding his departure from the public stage after a decade as one of the most powerful and controversial figures in European banking.
The surprise announcement Monday came on the same day as reports that Munich prosecutors had searched executive offices of Deutsche Bank on suspicion that Mr. Ackermann and other top executives had given false testimony in a long-running civil lawsuit. Deutsche Bank denied any wrongdoing. The timing of Mr. Ackermann’s announcement appeared to be a coincidence.
Paul Achleitner, chief financial officer of German insurer Allianz and also a figure of considerable stature in financial circles, will be nominated as chairman of the supervisory board at Deutsche Bank’s annual shareholders meeting, the bank said in a statement.
At Deutsche Bank and other German corporations, the supervisory board approves major decisions and appoints top executives, while the chief executive is in charge of day-to-day operations.
Mr. Ackermann, 63, became chief executive of Deutsche Bank in 2002, and oversaw a rise of the bank’s stature in global investment banking. He may be equally well known as a political operator. In recent months, he played a key role in negotiations to reduce Greece’s debt load and has been an informal adviser to Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. Mr. Ackermann is president of the Institute of International Finance, an industry group that has tried to blunt the effect of new regulations designed to make banks less crisis-prone.
Deutsche Bank has struggled this year to settle on a leadership structure that would follow Mr. Ackermann’s departure as chief executive. In July, the bank’s supervisory board agreed to split chief executive duties between Anshu Jain, head of the investment bank, and Jürgen Fitschen, head of the German unit. As part of the compromise solution, Mr. Ackermann was supposed to become chief of the supervisory board, replacing Clemens Börsig, with whom he had an acrimonious relationship.
Mr. Ackermann said he decided not to seek the post of supervisory board chairman because he was too busy to campaign for the post, which would require him to win support of major shareholders.
‘‘The extremely challenging conditions on the international financial markets and in the political-regulatory environment demand my full attention as the chairman of the bank’s management board,’’ he said in a statement.
Mr. Achleitner, 55, worked more than a decade at Goldman Sachs, becoming a partner and head of the investment bank’s German unit, before joining Allianz as chief financial officer in 1999.
Though not quite as well known as Mr. Ackermann, Mr. Achleitner also has influence beyond his company duties and was involved in frantic efforts in late 2008 by U.S. authorities and investment bankers to prevent a financial meltdown following the collapse of Lehman Brothers.
Mr. Achleitner said in a statement that he would resign his post at Allianz if chosen as chairman of the Deutsche Bank supervisory board.
The search of Deutsche Bank offices was related to a long-running civil suit by Kirch Group, a media company that was once one of Germany’s largest broadcasters. Kirch Group accuses Mr. Ackermann’s predecessor, Rolf Breuer, of precipitating the company’s bankruptcy in 2002 by publicly questioning its creditworthiness.
German media reported that prosecutors were investigating whether Mr. Ackermann and several other executives had given false evidence in the suit.
Detlev Rahmsdorf, a Deutsche Bank spokesman, called the investigation ‘‘groundless and completely out of proportion.’’
Barbara Stockinger, a Munich prosecutor who serves as spokeswoman for the state’s attorneys office there, confirmed that investigators had searched the offices of a company in connection with a civil suit, but would not give the name of the company.
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