Mixed Results For Leading Swiss Banks

by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-News.com, Brussels

15 August 2002

Switzerland's two leading banks, Credit Suisse and UBS experienced the second quarter to June very differently, according to figures released this week.

Credit Suisse, Switzerland's second largest bank, announced a second quarter net loss of SFr579 million ($368.8 million), according to the Swissinfo news service, blaming the 'unsatisfactory' result on weak equity markets.

UBS, on the other hand, posted a net profit for the quarter of SFr 1.331 billion ($890.3 million), although this still represents a fall of 4% on the same period last year.

Commenting on the favourable results, UBS Group President, Peter Wuffli told Swissinfo that: 'We have weathered the storm reasonably well, no disasters despite the rough market conditions.'

However, he added that the bank does not expect to escape the recent market turbulence completely, and predicted that UBS' full-year results would likely not match those achieved last year.

'Overall (it's) a mixed picture and quite a high degree of uncertainties,' the UBS chief observed.

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