GENEVA: Swiss banking giant UBS, hit with massive fines for manipulating global interest rates, has learned its lesson and is improving its control mechanisms, its chairman Axel Weber insisted in an interview published yesterday.
“We must learn from this crisis and avoid further damage to the bank,” Weber told the Blick in a joint interview with UBS chief executive Sergio Ermotti. “We are in the process of improving the control systems,” he said.
His comments came as a separate report charged that UBS had not only manipulated global interest rates, but had also tampered with Swiss franc interest rates for more than a decade.
UBS did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
US, British and Swiss authorities last week hit Switzerland’s largest bank with $ 1.5 billion in fines — the second-largest banking penalty ever — for massive misconduct in the setting of the Libor rate. That rate is used as a benchmark for global financial contracts worth about $300 trillion and affects financial products worldwide such as student loans and mortgages.
Both Weber and Ermotti stressed in yesterday’s interview that Swiss investigators had found no indication top UBS executives were aware of the misconduct.
But Weber acknowledged that responsibility for the Libor scandal lay “not only with the people who committed crimes, but also with those who were tasked with supervising them,” noting that people not directly involved in manipulating rates had also been fired.
The French-language daily Le Matin meanwhile reported in its Sunday edition that UBS had not only contributed to manipulating global interest rates on the dollar, the British pound and the yen.
It also “systematically played with interest rates on the Swiss franc. And that for more than 10 years,” Le Matin reported.
Quoting findings in a US justice department probe, the paper said there was evidence that UBS traders had manipulated the rates from 2001.
The paper criticized Switzerland’s financial regulator FINMA for not looking further back than 2007 when it calculated UBS’s misdeeds in Switzerland, and also lambasted the Swiss national bank for not releasing numbers on how much the bank had cost the Swiss economy.
The Swiss portion of the bank’s massive fine amounted to just 59 million Swiss francs ($ 64 million).
UBS ‘tampered with rates since 2001’
UBS ‘tampered with rates since 2001’
Saudi POS spending jumps 28% in final week of Jan: SAMA
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s point-of-sale spending climbed sharply in the final week of January, rising nearly 28 percent from the previous week as consumer outlays increased across almost all sectors.
POS transactions reached SR16 billion ($4.27 billion) in the week ending Jan. 31, up 27.8 percent week on week, according to the Saudi Central Bank. Transaction volumes rose 16.5 percent to 248.8 million, reflecting stronger retail and service activity.
Spending on jewelry saw the biggest uptick at 55.5 percent to SR613.69 million, followed by laundry services which saw a 44.4 percent increase to SR62.83 million.
Expenditure on personal care rose 29.1 percent, while outlays on books and stationery increased 5.1 percent. Hotel spending climbed 7.4 percent to SR377.1 million.
Further gains were recorded across other categories. Spending in pharmacies and medical supplies rose 33.4 percent to SR259.19 million, while medical services increased 13.7 percent to SR515.44 million.
Food and beverage spending surged 38.6 percent to SR2.6 billion, accounting for the largest share of total POS value. Restaurants and cafes followed with a 20.4 percent increase to SR1.81 billion. Apparel and clothing spending rose 35.4 percent to SR1.33 billion, representing the third-largest share during the week.
The Kingdom’s key urban centers mirrored the national surge. Riyadh, which accounted for the largest share of total POS spending, saw a 22 percent rise to SR5.44 billion from SR4.46 billion the previous week. The number of transactions in the capital reached 78.6 million, up 13.8 percent week on week.
In Jeddah, transaction values increased 23.7 percent to SR2.16 billion, while Dammam reported a 22.2 percent rise to SR783.06 million.
POS data, tracked weekly by SAMA, provides an indicator of consumer spending trends and the ongoing growth of digital payments in Saudi Arabia.
The data also highlights the expanding reach of POS infrastructure, extending beyond major retail hubs to smaller cities and service sectors, supporting broader digital inclusion initiatives.
The growth of digital payment technologies aligns with Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 objectives, promoting electronic transactions and contributing to the Kingdom’s broader digital economy.
