UBS Looks Down The Barrel of More Job Cuts

UBS is a name that many of you may not be that familiar with at all. That is unless you spend a lot of time looking for places to put money in Europe. So before we talk about the job cuts that are coming to the company lets begin with a look at how the company has chosen to describe themselves, “UBS draws on its 150-year heritage to serve private, institutional and corporate clients worldwide, as well as retail clients in Switzerland. We combine our wealth management, investment banking and asset management businesses with our Swiss operations to deliver superior financial solutions. Headquartered in Zurich and Basel, Switzerland, UBS has offices in more than 50 countries, including all major financial centers, and employs approximately 63,520 people. Under Swiss company law, UBS is organized as an Aktiengesellschaft, a corporation that has issued shares of common stock to investors. UBS AG is the parent company of the UBS Group (Group).”

Sadly the company is getting ready to cut back on about 400 workers in a bid to make the company more profitable, by reducing the expenses associated with keeping people on the payrolls. This sizable cut will come primarily from the front office workers in the region.

Interestingly the company has put out some second quarter results that may explain why the need for some job cuts in the near future, “UBS second-quarter pre-tax profit CHF 951 million; wealth management businesses’ net new money inflows increased to CHF 13.2 billion; industry-leading Basel 2.5 tier 1 ratio strengthened further to 19.2%; phase-in Basel III tier 1 ratio1 target of 13% already surpassed; Basel III RWA1 reduced by CHF 45 billion; Group and Investment Bank RWA targets lowered. In challenging conditions marked by increased volatility and greater client caution, UBS continued to execute its strategy and to deliver on its enduring commitment to clients, achieving pre-tax profit of CHF 951 million. Costs were managed prudently, keeping UBS on track to deliver its entire planned savings by the end of 2013.” That prudent cost management that the company mentioned did include some earlier cuts to jobs inside the company.

This is, as you can imagine, not the only bank in Switzerland that is making job cuts to work things out.  For those of you who missed out on our coverage of earlier cuts to Julius Baer here is an excerpt that will get you up to speed in no time at all, “For now the company is getting ready to make some serious job cuts in the near future. The job cuts are coming not from a loss of profits, but instead from a merger. The company is getting ready to cut an unspecified number of workers from its newly bough Bank of America Merrill Lynch workers, whose jobs focus on overseas wealth management. The number in unspecified because the company is getting ready to cut back on between 660 and 880 jobs, depending on how extensive the cuts end up to be.”

The company has not given much word on severance at this time.

Update: UBS Group of companies starts recruitment process once again having a lot of opportunities for job seekers. check here for latest openings at Granted.com.