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Tomorrow (Tuesday, March 19) marks the first anniversary of the event of the century in the Swiss financial sector: the state-backed takeover of major Swiss bank Credit Suisse by archrival UBS. Twelve months later, who are the winners and losers? finews.ch editor-in-chief Dominik Buholzer takes stock. 

The Winners

1. Feverish and Hectic Job Market

(Image: CS)

The takeover of Credit Suisse (CS) has undoubtedly fired up the job market in Swiss banking, particularly for executive positions. The last 12 months have seen more changes in the industry than ever before. Sabine Heller (image above) is a prime example of the feverish and hectic pace in the current job market.

Swiss private bank Lombard Odier recruited her from UBS after Heller - previously a director at CS - had already agreed to take over management of the Zurich region, as finews.ch also reported. But Heller made a U-turn and signed up to the Geneva-based company before she had even taken up her role at UBS.

The pace of job-hopping remains unabated for the time being. Swiss private banks Julius Baer and EFG International have worked particularly hard at poaching former CS staff and, of course, the surplus from UBS. At EFG, practically every third newly hired employee in consulting is from one of the two major banks.

2. UBS Investors in Champagne Mood

(Image: Keystone)

The merger was a profitable deal for UBS shareholders, with shares in Switzerland’s largest bank gaining around 75% over the last 12 months. 

This is unlikely to be the end of the story, as financial analysts expect a target price of up to 35 Swiss francs. UBS shares are currently worth 28 Swiss francs.

3. Cantonal Banks Are Winners of the Crisis

(Image: Shutterstock)

Many clients withdrew their assets from CS. Switzerland’s cantonal banks were and still are the clear winners of this redistribution. This is also the conclusion reached by Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU) in its study, which shows that around 82% of all Swiss clients leaving CS moved to cantonal banks.

The state-owned banks have been able to increase their market share in domestic deposits from private clients, businesses and institutional investors (excluding tied-up pension assets) by 4.4 percentage points to 31.4% since the start of 2021, while the big banks have seen their share shrink by 4.7 points to 28%.

Raiffeisen Switzerland and other Swiss private banks benefited less overall.

4. Karin Keller-Sutter up There With Beyoncé

(Image: EJPD / Keystone)

In Switzerland, federal councillor Karin Keller-Sutter (image above) came under heavy fire for the CS takeover. However, this did not take away from the Swiss finance minister’s international reputation. British business newspaper the Financial Times listed her as one of the most influential women in the world, alongside the likes of US singer Beyoncé and EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Keller-Sutter is regarded worldwide as having saved the Swiss economy with her decisive action in dealing with the CS crisis. «We all owe her a debt of gratitude,» said Swedish Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson in her words of praise.

5. Banks in the Corporate Banking Business

(Image: Commerzbank)

CS’s collapse has opened up new opportunities for many other banks, especially in corporate banking, where the once second-largest bank in Switzerland held an important position as a valid alternative to archrival UBS. This is how the market played out.

However, this is no longer the case. As a result, various foreign banks are now also trying to get hold of CS’s market share. Along with the cantonal banks and Raiffeisen banks, Commerzbank is one of the main contenders, as finews.ch also reported.

«We want a large slice of the cake,» Commerzbank Switzerland CEO Marc Steinkat (image above) recently told the Aargauer Zeitung. The Swiss export industry could be one of the beneficiaries. Industry association president Martin Hirzel complained last December that having just one major Swiss bank would create too much dependency.

Continues: The Losers.