Before its recent meltdown over an accounting scandal, Wirecard AG toyed with a deal to vault into the global financial elite.

The embattled payments-processing company last year considered a tie-up with Deutsche Bank AG and even approached the lender with the idea, according to people familiar with the matter and a McKinsey paper reviewed by Bloomberg News. While the bank had more than US$1 trillion in assets, its market value was less than Wirecard’s as recently as April.

The project, code-named Panther, was discussed among Wirecard executives late last year, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. Wirecard executives reached out to counterparts at Deutsche Bank in 2019, but the Frankfurt-based lender quickly ended the preliminary talks, the people said.

A draft 40-page feasibility analysis prepared by consultants at McKinsey, dated Nov. 15, 2019, concluded that the “value proposition of the combined entities will fundamentally reshape the ecosystem,” unlocking six billion euros (US$6.8 billion) of additional profit per year by 2025 by combining a bank and tech company.

The paper didn’t identify Wirecard or Deutsche Bank. But it was commissioned by the payments processor, and certain context information point to Deutsche Bank, including the use of the name of its information-technology system -- Autobahn.

Spokesmen for Wirecard, Deutsche Bank and McKinsey declined to comment.

The prospect of the card processor taking over Germany’s biggest lender highlights the sudden reversal of fortune for what was the best performer in the DAX 30 stock index in 2018. An 86 per cent collapse in its shares the past three days after the disclosure that 1.9 billion euros has gone missing marks the death knell of any ambitions beyond survival.

Wirecard’s market value now stands at 1.8 billion euros, compared to Deutsche Bank’s 17.2 billion euros.