A collection of sculptures by the Renaissance master Adrian de Vries at the Maximilian Museum in Augsburg, Germany, sits in a covered courtyard named for Kurt Viermetz, a native son widely considered the most well-known German in international banking.
It has been revealed that Deutsche Börse plans to appoint Herr Viermetz to head its supervisory board at the end of the year. Angry shareholders are probably hoping that he will be the right artist to remodel the German exchange after the embarrassing failure to acquire the London Stock Exchange earlier this year.
Herr Viermetz began his career as an assistant treasurer with JP Morgan in Frankfurt in 1965. A quarter-century later, he became the bank’s vice-chairman and director of the executive board. After retiring in 1999, he was named head of the overseeing board of Hypovereinsbank. He is also an adviser to the New York Stock Exchange and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
Herr Viermetz, 66, is a trustee of many German and American academic institutions, such as the American Academy in Berlin, and is an honorary director of the New York Philharmonic Society. He and his wife, Felicitas, divide their time between Munich and upstate New York.