Credit Suisse Group posted its first fourth-quarter net loss since 2008 as Switzerland’s second--biggest bank continued its drive to reduce its exposure to potentially risky investment banking at a time when Europe’s economy is facing problems related to a raging debt crisis.
The bank yesterday said its net loss in the fourth quarter amounted to 637 million Swiss francs (US$698 million), way down on analysts’ expectations for a more modest loss of SF431 million.
In the equivalent period in 2010, Credit Suisse posted a SF841 million profit.
Brady Dougan, chief executive officer of a bank that has about 50,000 staff around the world and manages more than US$1 trillion in assets, blamed the loss on tough market conditions and aggressive cuts in costs and risks, including the need to meet a new requirement that it hold more capital.
“Our performance for the fourth quarter 2011 was disappointing,” Dougan said. “It reflects both the adverse market conditions during the period and the impact of the measures we have taken to swiftly adapt our business to the evolving market and regulatory requirements.”
RESTRUCTURING COSTS
Dougan said an acceleration in its restructuring program cost the bank almost SF1 billion in the last quarter.
One of the most important changes stems from Credit Suisse’s attempt to cut the risk profile of it investment bank division. In November last year, Credit Suisse said that by the end of 2014, it would have cut risk-weighted assets by SF110 billion, mostly from the investment bank’s fixed-income unit.
Its investment bank saw revenues decline 64 percent in the fourth quarter, and that pushed the unit to its second consecutive quarterly loss.
Following confirmation of its quarterly loss, chief financial officer David Mathers told reporters the bank would propose a dividend of 75 centimes a share for last year, down from SF1.30 a share for the previous year.
TAX PROBE
Credit Suisse faces similar structural problem as crosstown rival UBS AG and has yet to close the book on a US tax evasion probe.
Mathers said he had no new comment on the tax probe.
On Tuesday, UBS AG, Switzerland’s biggest bank, reported that its profit fell 76 percent in the fourth quarter. The bank was hurt by a US$2 billion trading scandal last year and has been downsizing its investment bank to meet stricter capital requirements as Europe’s debt crisis hits the financial sector.
AI REVOLUTION: The event is to take place from Wednesday to Friday at the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center’s halls 1 and 2 and would feature more than 1,100 exhibitors Semicon Taiwan, an annual international semiconductor exhibition, would bring leaders from the world’s top technology firms to Taipei this year, the event organizer said. The CEO Summit is to feature nine global leaders from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), Applied Materials Inc, Google, Samsung Electronics Co, SK Hynix Inc, Microsoft Corp, Interuniversity Microelectronic Centre and Marvell Technology Group Ltd, SEMI said in a news release last week. The top executives would delve into how semiconductors are positioned as the driving force behind global technological innovation amid the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution, the organizer said. Among them,
When she was in fifth grade, Scarlett Goddard Strahan started to worry about getting wrinkles. By the time she turned 10, she and her friends were spending hours on ByteDance Ltd’s TikTok and Google’s YouTube watching influencers tout products for achieving today’s beauty aesthetic: a dewy, “glowy,” flawless complexion. Goddard Strahan developed an elaborate skin care routine with facial cleansers, mists, hydrating masks and moisturizers. One night, her skin began to burn intensely and erupted in blisters. Heavy use of adult-strength products had wreaked havoc on her skin. Months later, patches of tiny bumps remain on her face, and her cheeks turn
Demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips should spur growth for the semiconductor industry over the next few years, the CEO of a major supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said, dismissing concerns that investors had misjudged the pace and extent of spending on AI. While the global chip market has grown about 8 percent annually over the past 20 years, AI semiconductors should grow at a much higher rate going forward, Scientech Corp (辛耘) chief executive officer Hsu Ming-chi (許明琪) told Bloomberg Television. “This booming of the AI industry has just begun,” Hsu said. “For the most prominent
Former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) yesterday warned against the tendency to label stakeholders as either “pro-China” or “pro-US,” calling such rigid thinking a “trap” that could impede policy discussions. Liu, an adviser to the Cabinet’s Economic Development Committee, made the comments in his keynote speech at the committee’s first advisers’ meeting. Speaking in front of Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), National Development Council (NDC) Minister Paul Liu (劉鏡清) and other officials, Liu urged the public to be wary of falling into the “trap” of categorizing people involved in discussions into either the “pro-China” or “pro-US” camp. Liu,
RSS