Since it was established in 1994, comdirect bank has consistently extended its business model: today, the market leader among online brokers is the top direct bank for modern investors in Germany. In the B2C business line, with brokerage, banking and advice, comdirect provides all the financial services for private customers from a single source. At the start of 2009, comdirect significantly expanded its B2B business activities with the acquisition of ebase (European Bank for Fund Services GmbH).

From the beginning, comdirect has succeeded in understanding the needs of its customers and inspiring them with surprising solutions. With an extensive product range and transparent and attractive terms and conditions, the direct bank model is generally superior to traditional bank models. A local presence is becoming less and less important to investors who are now looking for a comprehensive product offering and independent advisory services. The past few years have confirmed the pertinence of this business model strategy and comdirect is now the first choice for more than 1.5 million self-determined private customers. This is a rise of over 40% compared with 2007.

comdirect's strategy is geared to income-oriented growth and long-term value added. The direct bank aims to continue to achieve sustainable growth and further enhance its profitability. Through the complus programme for the future launched at the start of 2009, in the B2C business line the bank aims to increase

- the number of customers to 2.3 million,
- assets under custody to EUR 50 billion and
- pre-tax profit to EUR 150 - 170 million.

To reach these goals, comdirect is investing an additional EUR 300 million up until 2013. The high performance IT platform forms the foundation for this growth, with further optimisations set to increase productivity and efficiency and create additional economies of scale. comdirect is also developing new, direct bank-type advisory models for investments and provisioning. These are based on comdirect's building finance model, which since 2008 has given customers access to independent advice and appropriate solutions from a pool of more than 250 financing partners.

comdirect is also developing new, direct bank-type advisory models, including for provisioning, which are based on comdirect's building finance model.

Wholly-owned subsidiary ebase represents the B2B business line within the comdirect group. ebase provides a platform for custody account services and transaction management for independent financial service providers, insurance companies and banks. ebase is to be expanded to become the leading B2B direct bank by 2013.