The Wüstenrot Bank AG Pfandbriefbank was a German bank based in

Ludwigsburg Ludwigsburg (; Swabian German, Swabian: ''Ludisburg'') is a Cities of Germany, city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, about north of Stuttgart city centre, near the river Neckar. It is the largest and primary city of the Ludwigsburg (district), Lu ...

. As a branchless

direct bank A direct bank (sometimes called a branch-less bank or virtual bank) is a bank that offers its services only via the Internet, mobile app, email, and other electronic means, often including telephone, online chat, and mobile check deposit. A direct ...

, it offered

checking accounts A transaction account (also called a checking account, cheque account, chequing account, current account, demand deposit account, or share account at credit unions) is a deposit account or bank account held at a bank or other financial instituti ...

, payment cards and securities trading.

Company History

On 9 August 1968, the ''Wüstenrot Bank AG'' for Housing was registered in the commercial register at the

district court District courts are a category of courts which exists in several nations, some call them "small case court" usually as the lowest level of the hierarchy. These courts generally work under a higher court which exercises control over the lower co ...

. The main task of the bank at that time was to support the customers of the '' Bausparkasse'' in financing their real estate projects. Later, the entire non-collective deposit business was taken over by the ''Bausparkasse''. In 1985, the construction of the first 10 bank branches began. In 1988 there were already 34 branches with 300 employees on the ground, and the range was expanded to include all forms of money and asset formation, current account payments,

personal loans In finance, unsecured debt refers to any type of debt or general obligation that is not protected by a guarantor, or collateralized by a lien on specific assets of the borrower in the case of a bankruptcy or liquidation or failure to meet the te ...

and securities transactions. The bank's name was also shortened to Wüstenrot Bank AG. However, the field service - especially the ''Wüstenrot Bausparkasse'' - saw the branches increasingly as competitors. The bank's sales did not perform as expected and lacked the necessary returns. In 1990, a reorganization took place centralizing all administrative tasks in the central administration and new, cheaper locations for the remaining branches were sought after. At the end of 2002 the last branch was dissolved. In 2005, the Wüstenrot Bank AG merged with ''Wüstenrot Hypothekenbank'' to form ''Wüstenrot Bank AG Pfandbriefbank''. It became one of the first universal banks with mortgage bond license under the new law. On June 1, 2017, the

parent company A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the Security (finance), securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own Share ...

Wüstenrot & Württembergische Wüstenrot & Württembergische (W&W) is a German financial services company that offers a range of products and services, including insurance, banking, and investment products. It based in Stuttgart founded in 1999. The Wüstenrot side of the b ...

AG'' announced that a sale of the bank would be considered. At the end of March 2018, the sale was made to ''Bremer Kreditbank''.

Affiliation

Client funds are secured by the Deposit Guarantee Fund of the Federal

Association of German Banks The ''Bundesverband deutscher Banken'' (BdB, also branded as Bankenverband and in English as Association of German Banks) is the representative body of profit-oriented banks in Germany and a key lobby group for Germany's financial sector. The Bd ...

and

Entschädigungseinrichtung deutscher Banken The Deposit guarantee scheme of German banks (''Entschädigungseinrichtung deutscher Banken'' in German) is a private institution legally responsible for guaranteeing the deposits of account holders of German banks in accordance with domestic legisl ...

. Since 2017,

online banking Online banking, also known as internet banking, virtual banking, web banking or home banking, is a system that enables customers of a bank or other financial institution to conduct a range of financial transactions through the financial institut ...

has been offered in cooperation with GAD, which was previously an in-house development. Furthermore, the ''Wüstenrot'' ATMs are connected to

CashPool CashPool is a cooperation of a multitude of smaller or virtual German private banks, in which they mutually waive ATM usage fees for their customers. It is not an interbank network but uses the pre-existing German ATM or Maestro/ Cirrus netwo ...

References

{{Authority control Banks of Germany Banks established in 1968 Corporate finance 1968 establishments in West Germany