Bank Credit Suisse is to cut about 2,000 jobs as it reported a “disappointing” second-quarter net profit, dented by weak trading activity and the strong Swiss franc.
The Swiss bank said on Thursday net profit fell to SFr768 million ($959 million), below average analyst forecasts of SFr1 billion and less than half the SFr1.6 billion made in the same period in 2010.

Operating income fell to SFr1.37 billion from SFr1.7 billion in the Q2 last year. New assets in private banking were SFr11.5 billion, below average analyst forecasts for SFr14.2 billion,

Full article

http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/Specials...l?cid=30783580

I am surprised ..... surprised first of all that the top brass at UBS and CS is surprised, Surprised 2nd to see that the banks do not profit from the high exchange rate of the CHF but apparently suffer from it.

Not surprised however to see that finance-people in the Euro-Zone no longer can pay as much as before.

Looks as if the CHF now also for the big banks has become a doubtful "asset" .


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And ehhhmmmm, the name of the company is NOT and never was "Bank C....." but it was "Schweizerische Kreditanstalt"/"Crédit Suisse"/"Credito Svizzera", and now simpy is Credit Suisse or in short CS

This mostly affects contractors and fixed term employees. Sorry and good luck to anyone affected by this.


"Many of the job cuts concern people hired in a post-crisis spree. Around 500 posts are to go in Switzerland. Implementation costs in 2011 would be SFr400-450 million."

ditto. All the Best.

I heard that they are specifically targeting people who have been there for some time at a relatively senior level of VP, Director or Managing Director and that some of the lay-offs are cynically motivated. A few years ago they switched the pension plan for most employee's, those that had been there for some time remained on the old style pension that is very expensive. The target group would largely fall in to the category of the old style pension.

Entirely credible. <gulp>

According to CS Mr Marc Dosch
http://www.nzz.ch/nachrichten/wirtsc....11669281.html
nobody in Switzerland will get sacked. The reduction will be done by normal fluctuations and by encouraging employees to undergo further education or re-education and to search for alternative things

You above mention employees and contractors. I don't know about banks, but in the transport industry and in retailing, contractors are NOT employees. And CS clearly speaks about a reduction of employees.

Short term / fixed term employees will be counted in the 500, that number will easily triple to include contractors.

As quoted above, CS declares NOT to sack anyone in Switzerland. But if you, if being in a senior position, get encouraged to undergo some additional education and to seach for alternatives, I think you know what you have to do At the other hand, highly qualified personnel will have it relatively easy to find new jobs. Any some of those directors (whatever denomination) may be encouraged to go into early retirement

I've seen this happen for real. Basically, they have a re-organisation and some positions are removed. The people are then offered a reduced role with a lower title knowing full well that they are likely to decline and look elsewhere.

CS is an awful place to work at the moment and I feel for the people that are there. The politics, rhetoric and mind games are not pleasant.

Short term and Fixed Term employees ARE employees, but part-time employees are NOT. That contractors no longer will be called up is obvious, so that, as you say, the INDIRECTly affected may rather be 1500 instead of 500 . And you of course can argue that the banks may reduce orders for new furniture, new computer-stuff etc, which will affect thousands of people in the end.

Two positive aspects however may result
A) the economy will get access to well educated personnel
B) the economy will get access to well maintained office buildings
both A) AND B) at relatively decent price levels

I couldn't possibly comment

My feeling with those bankers, whose megalomania I over decades at times found rather devastating, has its clear limits. I rather feel with suppliers of these banks, who at worst simply will lose a generous customer. But who knows, some of those suppliers will improve their service for the smaller customers in the coming times

Ah, but this is the cynical point. They are (apparently) targeting the one's that haven't reached the magic age of 58 when the early pension kicks in.

Don't count on it. A reduction of the number of employees does not equate to a reduction in the staffing levels. They will be getting in more contractors to fill up those empty seats.

I understand your comment, but you should remember that most staff work in back office services or IT. It is a relatively small percentage that are able to enter into the risky deals that cause problems.

No point of mentioning that, evil bankers (and don't forget those Franc speculators bringing franc to unreal levels!) get what they deserved. In Wolli's simple black&white world You are either poor hard-working guy or filthy rich thief. And if You work for a bank like half of this forum, then Your soul is rotten and doomed... or so it seems from his comments all over this place
It is funny to read for a while, but then I realized he might be serious...

Fixed that for you.

As one of those evil people working in these banks it always astonishes me how the banks can post a profit of nearly a billion for only 3 months and they have to lay off staff. I guess I will be even more upset when the currency turns again and all of a sudden these bankers are so clever because they made such huge amounts of money (read get HUGE bonuses) doing really trick clever stuff when in actual fact it's mostly to do with the currency fluctuations.

Would be interesting to revalue the profits on what the $/CHF exchange was at the begining of the year to see if the bank did actually miss their frofit expectations or if it is mostly to do with a strong chuff.

I am happy that I decided to take a job in a small investment firm in Zug rather than accepting the job in UBS and CS earlier this year.. Otherwise I think I will be one of the many thousands laid off...

An offer of 12 months salary - out the door, garden leave for 3mths?

I would.

They are laying off staff because they are not making enough money. The return on equity was 10% this quarter, so even though they made 800m this quarter and that is a huge number to comprehend for us mere mortals, it doesn't cover the cost of capital demanded by the owners.

Of the 2000 to be laid off I have seen reports that 500 will be in Switzerland. The remainder will I expect be in London and New York in the investment bank. The investment bank posted income of only 200m. I expect that poor performing capital intensive fixed income business lines will be most affected. Without wanting to sound harsh, banking has always been a hiring and firing industry and prone to overshooting on the upswing and downswing of hiring as well as knee-jerk reactions. They pay above Market rates to compensate for having less job security. If you take the devil's silver you have to accept the consequences...

If you look at the slides presented at the earnings call, there is quite a lot of empthasis on FX neutral results ie if rates hadn't moved.

In answer to Wollishofen's point about a strong CHF not being an asset for a Swiss bank there are two reasons for this. The majority of the investment bank's revenues and expenses are in USD. Secondly the majority of client assets are not held in CHF - banks typically take a performance fee from clients based on their assets under management. A strong CHF decreases the value of those non-CHF denominated assets and hence decreases revenues.