To the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main
We have performed an independent limited assurance engagement on the separate non-financial group report as well as the by reference qualified part “Our Organization” (further „non-financial group report”), of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main (further „Deutsche Bank“) according to § 315b HGB for the period from January 1 to December 31, 2017.
Management’s Responsibility
The legal representatives of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft are responsible for the preparation of the non-financial group report in accordance with §§ 315b, 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB.
This responsibility of the legal representatives includes the selection and application of appropriate methods to prepare the non-financial group report and the use of assumptions and estimates for individual disclosures which are reasonable under the given circumstances.
Furthermore, the responsibility includes designing, implementing and maintaining systems and processes relevant for the preparation of the non-financial group report in a way that is free of – intended or unintended – material misstatements.
Independence and Quality Assurance on the Part of the Auditing Firm
We are independent from the company in accordance with the requirements of independence and quality assurance set out in legal provisions and professional pronouncements and have fulfilled our additional professional obligations in accordance with these requirements.
Our audit firm applies the legal provisions and professional pronouncements for quality assurance, in particular the Professional Code for German Public Auditors and Chartered Accountants (in Germany) and the quality assurance standard of the German Institute of Public Auditors (Institut der Wirtschaftsprüfer, IDW) regarding quality assurance requirements in audit practice (IDW QS 1).
Practitioner’s Responsibility
Our responsibility is to express a conclusion based on our work performed of the non-financial group report within a limited assurance engagement.
We conducted our work in accordance with the International Standard on Assurance Engagements (ISAE) 3000 (Revised): “Assurance Engagements other than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information” published by IAASB. This standard requires that we plan and perform the assurance engagement to obtain limited assurance whether any matters have come to our attention that cause us to believe that the non-financial group report, has not been prepared, in all material respects in accordance with §§ 315b and 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB. We do not, however, issue a separate conclusion for each disclosure. In a limited assurance engagement the evidence gathering procedures are more limited than in a reasonable assurance engagement and therefore less assurance is obtained than in a reasonable assurance engagement. The choice of audit procedures is subject to the auditor’s own judgement.
Within the scope of our engagement, we performed amongst others the following procedures:
- Inquiries of personnel at Group level who are responsible for the materiality analysis to get an understanding of the process for identifying material topics and respective report boundaries for Deutsche Bank
- A risk analysis, including a media research, to identify relevant information on Deutsche Bank’s sustainability performance in the reporting period
- Evaluation of the design and implementation of the systems and processes for the collection, processing and control of disclosure on environmental, employee and social matters, respect for human rights as well as combatting corruption and bribery matters, and further matters including the collection and consolidation of quantitative data
- Inquiries of personnel who are responsible for determining disclosures on concepts, due diligence processes, results and risks, the conduction of internal controls and consolidation of the disclosures
- Evaluation of selected internal and external documents
- Analytical evaluation of data and trends of quantitative disclosures which are reported by all sites on group level
- Assessment of the overall presentation of the disclosures in the non-financial group report
Conclusion
Based on the procedures performed and the evidence received to obtain assurance, nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that the non-financial group report of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft for the period from January 1 to December 31, 2017 is not prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with §§ 315b and 315c in conjunction with 289c to 289e HGB.
Restriction of Use / Clause on General Engagement Terms
This report is issued for purposes of the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, only. We assume no responsibility with regard to any third parties.
Our assignment for the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, and professional liability is governed by the General Engagement Terms for Wirtschaftsprüfer and Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften (Allgemeine Auftragsbedingungen für Wirtschaftsprüfer und Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften) in the version dated January 1, 2017 (https://www.kpmg.de/bescheinigungen/lib/aab_english.pdf). By reading and using the information contained in this report, each recipient confirms notice of provisions of the General Engagement Terms (including the limitation of our liability for negligence to EUR 4 million as stipulated in No. 9) and accepts the validity of the General Engagement Terms with respect to us.
Frankfurt am Main, March 12, 2018
KPMG AG
Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft
[Original German version signed by:]
Laue
Wirtschaftsprüfer
[German Public Auditor]
Glöckner
Wirtschaftsprüfer
[German Public Auditor]