At UBS, digitization was one of Blessing’s early priorities. Investors will be looking to him to translate the rapid pace of digital change from the Swiss activities to the wider private bank. The larger unit is a potpourri of building blocks and projects: securities portal Cornerstone with private banking’s «Advice» services, robo-advisor Smartwealth, or newer projects with artificial intelligence and blockchain.
It is now up to Blessing to bring these disparate projects into line, in order to digitize wealth management from front to back. UBS also needs to show it is serious about pushing further down the wealth food chain with affluent foreign clients.
4. Destination: Platform Bank
Axel Weber’s new mantra? The UBS president says banks need to become platform providers, like tech giants Alibaba or Amazon, if they want to keep their lock on clients. UBS’ new billion-franc platform to book wealth management globally is the starting shot for Blessing to do so.
5. Lack of M&A Spark
Juerg Zeltner can count the takeovers he did during his tenure as private banking head on one hand. In 2015, the Swiss bank bought the Italian private banking activities of Spain’s Santander. Back in 2012, UBS attempted to recoup part of the damage from its Brazlian Banco Pactual disaster by buying broker Link. This summer, the bank bought multi-family office Consenso, also in Brazil.
The world’s largest private bank stayed on the sidelines in a period of massive consolidation in the wealth management industry, in Europe, Switzerland, and in Asia. To be sure, UBS was licking its financial crisis wounds for at least part of Zeltner’s tenure.
But the bank’s passivity as a potential acquirer became perceptible in 2012, when UBS cemented its position as the world’s largest wealth manager by assets. The honor led to a certain complacency. A big acquisition in a target market where UBS isn’t the wealth leader, like Latin America, would do the bank and its management good. In Europe, UBS is now technologically set up to scale up other banks it swallows. Lastly, a deal could give UBS’ lumbering wealth arm a cultural shot in the arm.
6. Lack of Invention
Blessing is taking on the heart of UBS’ business, but one which has shown little inclination to innovate in recent quarters. Overall CEO Sergio Ermotti has voiced irritation at the failure of UBS’ stock to budge, and recent gains have more to do with wider stock market gains since Donald Trump’s election and rising U.S. interest rates than anything UBS has done.
