About BankPraktiker

BankPraktiker

BankPraktiker is the monthly trade journal for specialists and managers of all banking groups in the German credit industry, published by the FCH AG (Finanz Colloquium Heidelberg) of Heidelberg — the specialist publisher for banks whose seminars, handbooks and journals serve the industry's practice. Appearing monthly in ten issues per year, it informs its readers compactly and solution-oriented on 48 pages about developments in the asset and liability business — the credit and investment business — as well as cross-departmental topics from the banking and financial-services industry. Its focus is the practice-oriented article: supervisory notices from banking oversight, legislative initiatives, current court rulings, and news from the associations of the individual banking groups — complemented by an info section with personnel news and specialist-book reviews. Under editor-in-chief Christina Schöning, BankPraktiker has served the banking practitioners since its first issue in 2005: the journal written by practitioners for practitioners, within the FCH group's specialist publishing for banks — alongside KreditPraktiker, Banken-Times and the group's seminars and consulting.

Overview

The German banking industry's practitioners — the credit officers, the investment advisors, the branch managers, the compliance officers across the private banks, the savings banks, the cooperative banks and the specialized institutions — work in one of the most regulated business environments in the economy: the banking supervision (BaFin, ECB), the ever-tightening regulatory frameworks, the court rulings reshaping the customer business, and the digitalization transforming the processes. BankPraktiker addresses this world with a program built around the practical: not the academic theory, not the strategic commentary, but the actionable knowledge — what the new supervisory notice means for the credit process, how the court ruling changes the advisory documentation, which legislative initiative is coming.

The editorial mix follows the banking practitioner's agenda. The asset-business coverage addresses the credit business: the lending practices and credit decisions, the collateral and security questions, the credit-process organization under the regulatory requirements, and the financing topics — from the corporate lending to the real-estate financing. The liability-business coverage treats the investment and deposit business: the advisory practice with its documentation duties, the product developments in the investment range, and the customer-business questions — the relationship management in the low-trust era. The supervisory and legal coverage provides the regulatory orientation: the BaFin and ECB notices translated into operational consequences, the legislative initiatives previewed before they take effect, the current rulings analyzed for their business impact, and the banking-criminal-law questions that define the compliance boundaries. The association news covers the banking groups' organizations: the private banks, the savings banks, the cooperative banks — each with their structures, their politics, and their market developments. The info section delivers the personnel news and the book reviews — the community's comings and goings and the professional literature. The program is calibrated for the practitioner: compact, solution-oriented, and immediately applicable — the month's practice-relevant developments distilled into the reading hour the busy banking professional can spare.

History

BankPraktiker was launched in 2005 — in the decade when the German banking industry's regulatory transformation accelerated. The publishers were the FCH AG (Finanz Colloquium Heidelberg), the Heidelberg specialist publisher for banks founded in 1996, and — until 30 June 2009 — the Fachverlag of the Verlagsgruppe Handelsblatt: the combination of the banking-practice specialist and the business-press group. The concept — the practice-oriented journal for the banking practitioners of all institute groups — filled the gap between the academic banking journals and the strategic banking press.

The journal's development tracks the banking industry's transformations: the pre-crisis boom, the 2008 financial crisis and its regulatory aftermath (Basel III, the supervisory tightening), the low-interest-rate era's margin pressure, the digitalization of banking processes, and the 2020s regulatory and technology shifts. Through these changes, the monthly rhythm (ten issues per year), the 48-page format, and the practice orientation remained the title's constants. The FCH group's growth — the Praktiker handbooks and commentaries, the KreditPraktiker and Banken-Times journals, the seminars and consulting, and the BankPraktiker Digital Flex single-article digital purchase — built the cross-media specialist publishing around the journal. The ISSN 1861-4884 identifies the title in the journal databases, where its two-decade run documents the banking practice's regulatory history.

Coverage and Content

Each month's issue follows the banking practitioner's agenda. The asset-business articles address the credit practice: the lending decisions, the collateral questions, the credit-process organization, and the financing innovations — written by practitioners for practitioners, with the case references and the procedural guidance. The liability-business articles treat the investment business: the advisory practice under the regulatory requirements, the product knowledge, and the customer-relationship questions.

The supervisory coverage provides the regulatory translation: the banking-supervision notices explained for the practice, the legislative initiatives previewed, and the implementation guidance. The legal coverage addresses the court rulings: the current judgments affecting the banking business — from the advisory-liability rulings to the fee-clause decisions — and the banking-criminal-law topics. The association news covers the institute groups' developments: the private banks' (BdB), the savings banks' (DSGV), and the cooperative banks' (BVR) news. The info section delivers the personnel news — the industry's appointments and departures — and the specialist-book reviews: the professional literature assessed for the practitioner's shelf. The program's compactness is its virtue: the 48 pages deliver the month's practice-relevant developments without the noise.

Organization and Ownership

BankPraktiker is published by the FCH AG (Finanz Colloquium Heidelberg) of Heidelberg — the specialist publisher for banks, financial-services institutions and financial companies, founded in 1996, whose business spans the specialist publishing, the seminars and the consulting. The editor-in-chief is Christina Schöning. The editorial team combines banking journalists with the practitioners as authors — the bank practitioners, the lawyers, the auditors, the judges and the supervisory officials who write the handbooks and the journal's articles: the practitioner-authorship that gives the title its practical authority and distinguishes it from the journals written about the banks rather than by their people.

Commercially, BankPraktiker follows the B2B specialist-press model: subscriptions from the banking industry's institutions (the specialists and managers across all institute groups), advertising from the banking industry's service providers — the IT vendors, the consulting firms, the training providers whose customers are the banks — plus the FCH group's seminar, handbook and Digital Flex revenues. The audience — the specialists and managers of the credit industry's institutions — is the banking practice's concentrated professional readership. The FCH group's positioning — the seminars, the consulting, the practitioner handbooks and commentaries — makes the journal part of an integrated practice-knowledge business.

Digital Presence

The journal's digital home is bankpraktiker.de, carrying the brand's online presence, the issue presentations, and the subscription services — the continuous extension of the monthly print rhythm. The BankPraktiker Digital Flex offers the single-article digital purchase: the Fachbeiträge individually acquirable and digitally readable — the pay-per-article model for the practitioner's targeted needs. The FCH group's newsletters (including the Banken-Times SPEZIAL target-group newsletters) deliver the news selection to the banking industry's inboxes.

The FCH group's digital platforms extend the brand: the seminar bookings, the handbook shop, and the consulting services. On social media, the brand maintains the banking community's channels. After two decades — from the 2005 launch through the financial crisis and the regulatory transformation to today's digital banking — BankPraktiker operates as the banking practitioners' monthly: the print journal for the compact, solution-oriented practice reading, the website and Digital Flex for the targeted digital access — the specialist journal for the specialists and managers of the credit industry, in print and online, month after month, year after year.