Commerzbank warned today that its profit target for the year was drifting out of reach as the global financial crisis hurts its debt investments and overshadows the economy.
Almost marking the end of his tenure as chief executive, Klaus-Peter Mueller cautioned investors that Germany's second-biggest bank was unlikely to repeat last year's €1.9 billion ($2.94 billion) net profit in 2008.
"It is going to be very hard," he said.
Commerzbank wrote down €244 million ($378 million) in the first quarter on debt instruments it owns and said this could yet rise.
The bill is tiny compared to the more prominent casualties of the global turmoil such as Switzerland's UBS, but complicates matters for a relatively small bank which had just completed a turnaround as the market crisis reared its head.
Commerzbank's writedowns depressed its first-quarter pretax profit, which fell to €410 million from more than twice as much a year earlier.
Larger rival Deutsche Bank last week reported its first quarterly loss in more than five years as global financial turmoil heaped more than $4 billion in writedowns on the bank.
Commerzbank's share price has tumbled by almost 40 per cent over the past year as worries about its subprime bill as well as fear of recession grew. It is now worth just €13 billion.
The Frankfurt-based bank is trading at a discount to German retail rival Postbank, which has a price earnings ratio of more than 11 times compared with Commerzbank on roughly eight times.