Axel Weber is not a man to shy away from difficult decisions. Last spring, he caused a political storm when he stepped down from his role at the head of Germany’s Bundesbank after disagreements with other policy makers over whether the European Central Bank should buy up government debt.
A year on, and now chairman of UBS, he is once again involved in a decision which has shocked the financial world. Yesterday, Switzerland’s largest bank by assets initiated the most significant overhaul of an investment bank since the financial crisis.
The shake-up will cut UBS staff numbers by a sixth and its risk-weighted assets by a third, and leave the bank focused on its wealth management business, supported by a much smaller investment bank specialising in equities trading, foreign exchange, precious metals, advisory work and research activities.