Julius Baer replaces CEO, exits private debt after Signa hit
Reuters
Published Feb 01, 2024 01:38AM ET
Updated Feb 01, 2024 07:11AM ET
By Noele Illien
ZURICH (Reuters) - Julius Baer ousted its CEO and said it would exit the private debt business on Thursday as the Swiss bank reported losses of 586 million Swiss francs ($679 million) on loans to collapsed property firm Signa.
Austrian property magnate Rene Benko's Signa Group, which was Julius Baer's largest client in its private debt business, collapsed into insolvency late last year.
Philipp Rickenbacher, Julius Baer's CEO since 2019, had previously played down the fallout, which surfaced in November, the latest damaging episode for a Swiss institution dating back to 1890.
But after a board meeting on Wednesday and a writedown that exceeded analyst expectations, Julius Baer said it had decided by mutual agreement that Rickenbacher would step down.
Rickenbacher said in a Linkedin post that it was in the best interests of the bank for him to step down and he did so with "an extremely heavy heart" after two decades at Julius Baer.
His deputy, Nic Dreckmann, will take over while Julius Baer begins a search for an external candidate.
Rickenbacher had been brought in to steady the ship after a series of scandals including regulatory probes.
"I deeply regret that the full loss allowance for the largest exposure in our private debt business has significantly impacted our net profit for 2023," Chairman Romeo Lacher said.
Julius Baer's shares surged 10% on Thursday as investors welcomed efforts to clean up the Signa-related problems.
The 586 million Swiss franc writeoff was significantly more than the 400 million franc loss analysts had estimated.
The bank will also cut 250 jobs in 2024, some 3% of its workforce, a spokesperson for Julius Baer confirmed, but said it was part of a previously announced cost cutting drive.
Julius Baer also said it would exit the risky private debt business, where collateral is typically unissued shares, and re-focus its lending activities on mortgage and lombard lending.
"We are refocusing our lending activity on more traditional areas, which are an important part of our wealth management offering," Lacher said in a statement.
PROFIT FALLS
The bank reported a net profit attributable to shareholders of 454 million francs for the full year, down 52% from 950 million francs in 2022.
It had already dampened profit expectations in an interim update for the first 10 months of 2023.
Julius Baer CFO Evie Kostakis expects the wind down of the private debt business will largely be completed by 2026.
Clients have not been pulling their money from the bank in light of the exposure, she said in a call with reporters.
"In November and December we had further inflows and our deposits remained very, very stable," she said.
Get The News You Want
Baer, which increased its number of relationship managers by 95 last year and was seen as a possible beneficiary of Credit Suisse's demise, reported net inflows of 12.5 billion for 2023.
($1 = 0.8634 Swiss francs)
Written By: Reuters
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