UBS Meets Expectations with $2.7 Billion Q3 Profit

ZURICH, Oct 28 (Reuters) - UBS reported a third-quarter net profit of $2.69 billion on Wednesday, up 8% year-on-year and roughly in ​line with the $2.71 billion expected as per a company-provided consensus forecast.

The ‌performance of the largest Swiss bank was supported by net new assets of $55 billion in global wealth management, driven by inflows of $18 billion in Asia and $17 billion in the Americas.

Profitability in ​the Americas improved, with the profit-before-tax margin up by over 2 ​percentage points, UBS said.

The integration of former rival Credit Suisse is ⁠on track for completion by year-end, the bank added, with cumulative cost savings ​by end-2026 now expected at around $13.7 billion, up from around $13.5 billion.

Staff levels dropped by ​almost 1,500 full-time employees in the quarter as integration progressed. Employees at the bank are running more than 12,700 personal AI agents and the bank keeps investing in the technology, UBS ​said.

The bank's cost-income ratio dropped to 72.3% at the end of the third ​quarter from 77% a year earlier.

UBS repurchased $1.8 billion of shares in the quarter and plans ‌to complete ⁠its buyback program of $3 billion in February, rather than by the mid-2027 timeline it had announced previously.

The bank has conditioned the amount and pace of share buybacks on the outcome of a Swiss banking rules overhaul that follows the 2023 collapse ​of Credit Suisse and ​its state-engineered emergency ⁠takeover by UBS.

New capital rules for UBS are currently being debated in a parliamentary committee and expected to reach the lower ​house floor in December. The Swiss upper house last month proposed ​rules that ⁠UBS suggested were unacceptable.

UBS's chairman has warned the bank would need to carefully consider its future in Switzerland if capital requirements are too harsh, and some shareholders have called ⁠for ​UBS to leave Switzerland.

UBS hopes that parliament will reach ​a solution that supports Switzerland's financial stability without imposing undue costs on UBS's shareholders, clients and employees, ​the bank said in its results presentation.