UBS to slash investment banking

Swiss banking giant UBS is expected to announce a major scaling back of its investment banking operations, sources told Britain's The Daily Telegraph. UBS declined comment on the reported plan, which would eliminate as many as 10,000 jobs in the coming months. The newspaper said Chief Executive Sergio Ermotti was scheduled to release UBS's third quarter results Oct. 30. Swiss authorities have been pressing the nation's largest bank to scale back its trading operations ever since Ermotti joined UBS after a trading scandal last year. The Daily Telegraph said Ermotti intended to shift investment banking to non-core status to cuts costs and reduce the company's weighted-risk assets. The non-core operation would be further wound down over time. The change is expected to take several quarters to accomplish and could affect about 16 percent of the current UBS workforce of 63,250.