management division with a slimmed-down geographical management
organisation aimed at strengthening its hands-on management
capabilities. It will now have four regions, instead of seven
previously – Asia-Pacific; Western Europe, the Mediterranean,
Middle East and Africa; North, East and Central Europe; and the
US.
This is the first visible sign of the thinking of new private
banking head Raoul Weil, who stepped into the role unexpectedly in
June after the bank ousted chief executive Peter Wuffli in July
over a money-losing inhouse hedge fund and subprime
exposures.
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The well-regarded Kathryn Shih will head Asia-Pacific, Francesco
Morra takes Western Europe and related regions, and Juerg Zeltner
will be in charge of North and Central Europe.
The changes also bring more control from Switzerland for its US
operations, centred on its PaineWebber brokerage business which was
bought for about $11 billion in 2000. UBS will send a high-level
Swiss executive, Anton Stadelmann, to the US as the brokerage’s
CFO. Stadelmann is currently CFO for Global Wealth Management and
Business Banking.
This suggests UBS will redouble efforts to strengthen the lagging
profitability of the US division up to the level of its
international businesses, involving moving away from the
traditional brokerage-driven transaction model in US wealth
management.
As part of this push, UBS is rapidly building a separate US network
of offices aimed at ultra-wealthy clients with more than $10
million of investable assets. These branches are manned by a staff
of private wealth advisers, specialists and related service
personnel covering trust and estate planning, lending services,
charitable giving, investment management, alternative investments
and structured products.
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By GlobalDataIn Switzerland, UBS will merge its domestic Wealth Management and
Business Banking businesses under the leadership of Alain Robert.
All business areas will continue to report to Weil.
At the same time, Mark Branson, chief executive of UBS Securities
Japan, will take on the function of CFO of Global Wealth Management
and Business Banking and will relocate to Zurich.
