Report: Swiss competition watchdog seeks probe into dominant position of UBS
Switzerland's competition commission has reportedly called for an in-depth investigation into UBS's dominant position since its rescue of Credit Suisse last year.
The competition commission (COMCO) late last year submitted its findings to market regulator FINMA in a report examining the impact of the takeover, Reuters said on February 29, citing anonymous sources.
The contents of the report have not been previously reported. The source spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
The competition watchdog told Reuters it would take a position once FINMA had reached a decision but would not comment at this stage on the content of that position. FINMA confirmed to the agency that a review of the situation was underway, while UBS declined to comment.
COMCO confirmed to the Keystone-SDA news agency that it had sent a report to FINMA. However, a spokesperson said that the report would not be published until the financial market supervisory authority had reached a decision. By law, responsibility for bank mergers lies with FINMA, and COMCO can only make recommendations.
The report in question contains recommendations for improving competition in certain areas, according to Reuters. COMCO refused to give any specific details of the report’s content.
FINMA told Keystone-SDA that an investigation into the consequences of the UBS takeover of Credit Suisse was underway. The merger of the two major banks was authorised on March 19, 2023, and FINMA will not comment on any further measures. It also refused to say when a decision would be taken.
Translated from French by DeepL/sb
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. You can find them here.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
More
Why Switzerland is among the ten fastest-warming countries in the world
More
In Switzerland four out of ten people have a migrant background – who are they?
More
Suicides in Switzerland quadruple among older people
More
French gangs target luxury cars in Switzerland
More
Renewed controversy in Switzerland over US fighter jets – explained
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.