UBS CEO warns of painful jobs decisions after Credit Suisse takeover (updated)

Credit Suisse AG

02/06/2023 12:51

(Adds details, background)
    By John Revill
       BERN, June 2 (Reuters) - UBS  UBSG.S  Chief Executive
Sergio Ermotti on Friday warned of painful decisions about job
cuts following the takeover of Credit Suisse  CSGN.S , which he
said he hoped would be formalised in coming days.
    "We won't be able to create, short term, job opportunities
for everybody. Synergies is part of the story," Ermotti said at
an event organised by the Asset Management Association
Switzerland in Bern.
    "We need to take a serious look at the cost base of the
standalone and combined organisations and create a sustainable
outcome," he added. "It will be painful."
    Switzerland's no. 1 bank, which agreed in March to take over
its smaller Swiss rival as part of a rescue orchestrated by
Swiss authorities, has said it aimed to close the deal quickly.
    "Hopefully in the next few days it's going to be done,"
Ermotti said on Friday. "We are finalising the last the last few
miles ... we have more than 170 approvals from regulators."
    Ermotti, who led UBS from 2011 to 2020, returned as CEO in
April to oversee the biggest banking deal since the global
financial crisis.
    While he stressed it was a takeover and not a merger,
Ermotti said Credit Suisse had many good people and talents,
suggesting its executives may play a greater role in the
combined group than the initial leadership team unveiled last
month might indicate. That management reshuffle only saw Credit
Suisse CEO Ulrich Koerner joining the top leadership.
    "We will have a more even distribution of jobs ..than the
one I did myself," he said. "When the dust settles down ...the
best thing for our clients and shareholders and our people is to
have the best people in the jobs."
    He also insisted that the new combined entity, which will
have a balance sheet of $1.6 trillion - roughly double the size
of Switzerland's annual economic output - was not too large for
Switzerland. 
    Switzerland's Social Democratic Party has drawn up proposals
to shrink UBS assets after its takeover of Credit Suisse to
reduce the risk of another expensive state-backed rescue.
    "I don't think we are too big for Switzerland," Ermotti
said, adding that in banking "size matters."

 (Reporting by John Revill
Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
 ((John.Revill@thomsonreuters.com; +41 41 528 36 37; Reuters
Messaging: john.revill.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))