UBS Axes 56 Luxembourg Jobs in Latest Cost-Reduction Initiative

Switzerland's largest bank, UBS, has completed its plans for a relocation of 56 back-office jobs from its Luxembourg branch to its office in Wroclaw, Poland, as part of the bank’s cost-cutting strategy as it seeks to restore profitability.

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The local bank branch and the unions agreed on a redundancy plan after UBS originally planned to cut 60 jobs in Luxembourg but whittled this number down after trade union negotiations.

UBS Luxembourg, which currently employs 420 people, is aiming to minimise the negative effects of the job cuts on its employees and offer other jobs within the bank or early retirement to the affected personnel.

Increasing Pressures

All banks are facing pressure to cut their spending during times of rising regulatory costs, negative interest rates, waning profit margins and lagging revenues.

Only last week, Finance Magnates reported that in a bid to cut costs and improve the bottom line, Barclays had slashed 13,600 jobs in the nine months since the arrival of its chief executive, equating to around 10 percent of its staff.

Although UBS has refocused its business more towards wealth management and away from investment banking following the financial crisis, certain segments of the world's largest wealth management unit had hiring caps imposed after waning profits back in July on the back of a dismal Q1 profit that sunk -64.0%, resulting in part from a slump at the wealth-management and securities units.