Feed them to Crocodiles- Swiss Sentiments about UBS
For a long time I have resisted the urge to link to articles related to the financial meltdown though I have been following it to the best of my ability. But the reaction of the Swiss investors to the UBS debacle as reported in BBC is just too good to pass. Among other things, one investor offered sausages to the UBS chairman in the meeting! A poster declares them to be United Bandits of Switzerland (UBS). And this is not all, there are many more nuggets in the article.
Well, those responsible were plain to see - a phalanx of UBS chief executives in expensive suits, on a raised dais, bathed in spotlights. It was not the best public relations image.
The Swiss know that UBS bosses earned among the highest salaries in Europe. Added to that were huge bonuses which they continued to award themselves even as the financial crisis unfolded.
I think there is more irony than humor and like everyone I am also wondering, when will all this end. I would also be very curious to see if there is a fundamental change in the executive salary structure by the time this crisis has played itself out.
posted by Mridula at 1:10 PM
2 Comments:
Thank you for that link. I am Swiss, and of course, it's discussed quite often amongst my friends and I. What to do with our meagre bank accounts? Leave it or go away? What happens if we leave? I think it's quite pathetic of Mr. Minder to say, "it's un-Swiss" to engage in sub-primes. Where were the shareholders and governing board when that was decided to do? Did they intervene? Not to my knowledge – greediness gets the better of people, and the Swiss are no exception. The question is why do we have highly educated people like Ospel and his managers who aren’t able to figure out in advance that something like that is bound to become a disaster? He paid back his last years benefits, but if he would have just a hint of integrity, he wouldn’t have collected it in the first place. The sad fact is, that things like that happen almost on a daily basis in lots of businesses. Where are we headed?
Thanks Fida for sharing your views from the insider perspective. I seriously wonder if a crisis of this scale will bring some changes in the thinking about business or in a few years time it would be business as usual. I mean the argument that market knows the best has taken a serious knock at the moment.
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