UBS


UBS Group AG is a Swiss multinational investment bank and financial services firm founded and based in Switzerland, with headquarters in both Zurich and Basel. It holds a strong foothold in all major financial centres as the largest Swiss banking institution and the world's largest private bank. UBS manages the largest amount of private wealth in the world, counting approximately half of The World's Billionaires among its clients, with over US$7 trillion in assets. Based on international deal flow and political influence, the firm is considered one of the "biggest, most powerful financial institutions in the world". UBS is also a leading market maker and one of the eight global 'bulge bracket' investment banks. Due to its large presence across the Americas, EMEA and Asia–Pacific markets, the Financial Stability Board considers it a global systemically important bank and UBS is widely considered to be the largest and most sophisticated "truly global investment bank" in the world, given its market-leading positions in every major financial centre globally.
UBS investment bankers and private bankers are known for their strict bank–client confidentiality and culture of [|banking secrecy]. Apart from private banking, UBS provides wealth management, asset management and investment banking services for private, corporate and institutional clients with international service. The bank also maintains numerous underground bank vaults, bunkers and storage facilities for gold bars around the Swiss Alps and internationally. UBS acquired rival Credit Suisse in an emergency rescue deal brokered by the Swiss government and its Central bank in 2023, following which UBS' AUM increased to over $5 trillion along with an increased balanced sheet of $1.6 trillion.
In June 2017, its return on invested capital was 11.1%, followed by Goldman Sachs' 9.35%, and JPMorgan Chase's 9.456%. The company's capital strength, security protocols, and reputation for discretion have yielded a substantial market share in banking and a high level of brand loyalty. Alternatively, it receives routine criticism for facilitating tax noncompliance and off-shore financing. Partly due to its banking secrecy, it has also been at the centre of numerous tax avoidance investigations undertaken by U.S., French, German, Israeli and Belgian authorities. UBS operations in Switzerland and the United States were respectively ranked first and second on the 2018 Financial Secrecy Index. UBS is a primary dealer and Forex counterparty of the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Corporate structure

UBS is a joint-stock company, pursuant to Swiss laws. Its shares are listed at the SIX Swiss Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. As of December 2020, UBS is present in all major financial centres worldwide, such as New York, London, Zürich, Berlin, Sydney, and Singapore. UBS has offices in 50 countries, with about 30% of its approximately 73,000 employees working in the Americas, 30% in Switzerland, 19% in Europe, the Middle East and Africa and 21% in the Asia Pacific region. The bank has a major presence in the United States. Its American headquarters for investment banking are located in New York City, and for private wealth management advisory in Weehawken, New Jersey. They have sales & trading, along with private wealth management offices in Stamford, Connecticut.
The company's global business groups provide services that entail: global wealth management, investment banking, asset management and personal & corporate banking. UBS is the leading provider of retail banking and commercial banking services in Switzerland, and they have been on top of the Swiss market since in 2009. Looking holistically, UBS' overall invested assets is $3.101 billion, shareholders' equity is $52.928 billion and market capitalization is $45.907 billion at the end of the year 2018. In November 2014, the shares in UBS Group AG were listed and started trading as a new holding company at the New York Stock Exchange and the SIX Swiss Exchange. Upon application and with effect as of 14 January 2015, the shares of UBS AG, a subsidiary of the UBS Group AG, were delisted from the NYSE. As of September 2019, the largest institutional shareholders are:
Owner name%
Chase Nominees Ltd., London11.76
DTC, New York7.57
Nortrust Nominees Ltd., London4.53

As of 31 December 2024, the geographical distribution of the shareholders presents itself as follows:
Shareholders%Shares%
Americas1,9960.8370,150,43110.7
Asia Pacific6,5962.731,194,7371.0
Europe, Middle East and Africa15,2126.3260,463,2308.0
Switzerland218,40090.2723,747,13521.5
Total Registered Shares1,385,555,53341.2
Total Unregistered Shares2,076,532,18958.8
Total242,204100.03,854,589,522100.0

As of June 2018, UBS's corporate structure includes four divisions in total, namely:
  • Global Wealth Management
  • Personal & Corporate Bank
  • Asset Management
  • Investment Bank
Starting on 9 June 2003, all UBS business groups, including UBS Paine Webber and UBS Warburg, were rebranded under the UBS moniker following company's start of operations as a unified global entity.

Global Wealth Management

UBS's global wealth management advisory division offers high-net-worth individuals around the world a range of advisory and investment products and services. As of the end of 2016, UBS Wealth Management's invested assets totalled CHF 977billion. The whole companies assets under management amounted to US$1,737.5 billion in 2015, representing a 1% decrease in AUM compared to the equivalent data of 2014. As of 2018, UBS manages the largest amount of private wealth in the world, counting approximately half of The World's Billionaires among its clients. More than 60% of total invested assets in UBS Wealth Management belong to individuals with a net worth of CHF 10 million or more. Of the remaining 40% of total invested assets, 30% of the total belong to individuals with net worth between CHF 1 million and CHF 10 million and the last 10% of total assets belong to individuals with a net worth of less than CHF 1 million.
UBS offers brokerage services and products as well as asset management and other investment advisory and portfolio management products and services. Additionally, UBS provides a broad range of securities and savings products that are supported by the firm's underwriting and research activities as well as clients' orders management and execution and also clearing services for transactions originated by individual investors. The business is further divided geographically with separate businesses focused on the U.S. and other international markets. Two-thirds of the total invested assets come from Europe and Switzerland, with the final third coming mainly from the Asia-Pacific region.
File:UBS Weehawken 2017.jpg|thumb|UBS U.S. wealth management headquarters at Lincoln Harbor in Weehawken, New Jersey |214x214px
With its headquarters in Switzerland, UBS Wealth Management is present in more than 40 countries with approximately 190 offices. As of the end of 2018, around 23,600 people worldwide were employed by Global Wealth Management. In Switzerland, UBS Swiss Bank provides a complete set of retail banking services that includes chequing, savings, credit cards, and mortgage products for individuals. They offer cash management and commercial banking services for small businesses and corporate clients as well.
UBS global wealth management advisory operations in the Americas consists of U.S. and Canadian wealth management businesses, as well as international business booked in the U.S. UBS Wealth Management in the U.S. is an outgrowth of the former Paine Webber brokerage business. The business was initially renamed UBS Paine Webber in March 2001, after it was acquired by UBS. The division offers wealth management advice for ultra-high net worth and high net worth clients. UBS was named "Best Bank for Wealth Management in North America" at the Euromoney Awards for Excellence 2017.
In January 2026, it was announced that UBS began leasing 26,000 square feet of office space in Dallas, Texas to launch its UBS Wealth Advice Center hub.
UBS's main competitors in this division are Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Charles Schwab.

Personal and Corporate Banking

UBS's Personal & Corporate Banking division delivers financial products and services to retail, corporate and institutional clients in Switzerland. It also provides stable and substantial profits for the Group and revenue opportunities for businesses within the bank. UBS maintains a leading position in the retail and corporate loan market in Switzerland; in fact, it serves one in three pension funds, more than 85% of the 1,000 largest Swiss corporations and 85% of banks that resides within the nation. In 2015, 2017 and 2018, the international financial magazine Euromoney named UBS "Best Domestic Cash Manager Switzerland". As of 31 December 2018, its lending portfolio reached US$131 billion.
The products that this UBS division offers range from cash accounts, payments, savings and retirement plans to investment fund products, residential mortgages and advisory services. This business division constitutes a central building block of UBS's universal bank delivery model in Switzerland and it supports other divisions, such as Investment Bank, by referring clients to them and by assisting them to build their wealth to a level at which they can be transferred to UBS Wealth Management. The retail and corporate distribution network comprises not only 279 branches in Switzerland, but 1,250 teller machines and self-service terminals, as well as digital banking services, serving 2.5 million personal banking clients.