Family offices in Frankfurt

A family office manages a large private fortune the way a private bank manages a client account, but built entirely around one family or a small group of them, independent of a specific bank. It typically covers investment management, tax and legal coordination, succession planning and administrative work such as accounting and property oversight. BaFin describes family offices as firms that manage large private assets independently of a bank, and notes that the term itself has no fixed legal definition in Germany.

The field splits into two very different models. A single-family office serves one family only and usually sits outside the wealthy family's own structure. A multi-family office, sometimes called an external family office, takes on several unrelated families as clients under individual contracts, and looks and is regulated much more like a financial services firm.

The best-known name in the city is the Family Office der Frankfurter Bankgesellschaft AG, a subsidiary of the Frankfurter Bankgesellschaft Group, itself the private bank of the German savings bank group (Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe). It is a multi-family office and, by its own description, is the only multi-family office open to clients across the entire savings bank network, based at Junghofstraße 24 in the city center.

Frankfurt's larger banks run family office style units for their wealthiest clients under a different name. Deutsche Bank's unit for ultra-high-net-worth clients, based in the city, took over the family office business previously run as Deutsche Oppenheim, and Commerzbank has a dedicated team for ultra-high-net-worth clients and family offices that also covers Berlin, Düsseldorf, Munich, Hamburg and Stuttgart from its Frankfurt base. A family in this bracket typically compares an independent multi-family office such as the one at Frankfurter Bankgesellschaft against a bank-owned unit before choosing.

Whether a family office needs a BaFin license depends entirely on who it serves. A pure single-family office that manages the wealth of one family and takes no outside clients generally needs no license, because the office and the investor are treated as the same economic unit. The moment a family office manages money for several unrelated families on a commercial basis, it needs authorization under the Banking Act (KWG) or the Kapitalanlagegesetzbuch (KAGB), the same laws that license banks and fund managers.

Some activities stay license-free regardless of structure, according to BaFin's own guidance note: general advice to a wealthy family, mediation in family disputes, accounting, controlling and administrative services such as travel planning do not by themselves trigger KWG or KAGB authorization. Investment advice, discretionary portfolio management and custody of securities do trigger it once the office serves clients beyond its own family, which is why every multi-family office in Frankfurt operates under a banking or investment firm license, directly or through a partner bank.

Succession is the constant topic. A family office exists in large part to move a fortune to the next generation without breaking it apart, and Commerzbank names exactly this, alongside strategic asset allocation and access to private markets, as what wealthy families ask their advisors about. Private markets funds and ELTIFs have become a bigger part of that conversation as semi-liquid structures make illiquid assets easier to hold inside a family office portfolio.

Digital assets are the newer addition. Advisors serving family office clients can now distribute tokenized real-world assets through the GDX Primary Market, and bitcoin increasingly comes up as a portfolio question, an area the Finance Loop bitcoin masterclass covers directly.

Finance Loop is the meeting place in Frankfurt where family office professionals talk with private bankers, asset managers and the founders building new investment products. It connects the finance, IT and AI communities and is built in collaboration with TechQuartier and Frankfurt Main Finance.

For advisors serving family office clients, the one-day masterclass Bitcoin for Investors, held in Frankfurt, Munich and Berlin, covers portfolio fit, access routes and custody for bitcoin. Finance Loop Premium Partner Gubbi brings its work on distribution-ready tokenized assets into Finance Loop events. Related pages: private banking in Frankfurt and asset management in Frankfurt.

A single-family office serves one family only and generally needs no BaFin license, because it manages the assets of its own owners, not outside clients. A multi-family office takes on several unrelated families under individual contracts and, once it gives investment advice or manages portfolios commercially, needs authorization under the Banking Act or the Kapitalanlagegesetzbuch.

The Family Office der Frankfurter Bankgesellschaft AG is the multi-family office tied to the German savings bank group and is based in the city. Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank both run dedicated units for ultra-high-net-worth clients and family offices from their Frankfurt headquarters, alongside smaller independent and single-family offices that do not publish their client lists.

Family office jobs in Frankfurt are posted on the career pages of the firms named above, and roles range from portfolio management and tax coordination to client service and back-office administration. Because many single-family offices are small and do not advertise widely, a personal network in the private banking and asset management field, of the kind built at Finance Loop events, is often how a role is filled.