Pinsent Masons advised Schütz Family Office on the acquisition of Freie Internationale Sparkasse

Schütz Family Office (SFO) has acquired the Luxembourg-based private bank Freie Internationale Sparkasse S.A. (FIS) from Sparkasse Bremen AG. Pinsent Masons, under the direction of Dr. Markus J. Friedl, advised SFO on all legal aspects of the purchase agreement under German law.

Schütz Family Office is owned by Alexander Schütz, who is founder and CEO of Vienna-based C-Quadrat Investment Group (CQ), entrepreneur and member of the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank AG. CQ is the largest independent asset manager in Austria, with assets under management in excess of €8 billion.

FIS was originally founded by Sparkasse Bremen AG as a Luxembourg branch. Since 2001, FIS has been operating as an independent credit institution with a full banking license and primarily serves wealthy private clients as well as institutional clients. As of December 31, 2019, FIS had total assets of around €40 million and manages a total of around €600 million in assets. The seller, Sparkasse Bremen, is an independent savings bank with total assets of over €12 billion and more than 1,200 employees.