UBS, the Swiss banking group, is shedding 3,500 jobs as part of a sweeping cost-cutting programme aimed at reshaping its business for a much tougher climate, particularly within its struggling investment banking division.
The cuts announced on Tuesday – totalling about 5 per cent of UBS’s global workforce – were signalled in last month’s dismal second-quarter results, when chief executive Oswald Grübel scrapped a group profit target of SFr15bn ($19bn).
Almost half of the reductions will be made in the investment bank as UBS focuses on developing its flagship wealth management arm in fast-growing markets while scaling back efforts to rebuild sales and trading operations battered by the financial crisis.