The general meeting of the UBS shareholders took place on Wednesday: the remuneration report, the CS integration and the sustainability report were discussed for around 4.5 hours. The UBS shareholders approved the remuneration report in an advisory vote with 83.5 percent. All board members were voted with at least 97 percent of the vote re-elected.
UBS CEO Sergio Ermotti already sees “a lot of progress” in the integration of Credit Suisse into UBS. However, significant restructuring measures and optimizations are still needed before the major bank can fully exploit the advantages of the merger, said Ermotti on Wednesday at the general meeting in Basel.
The UBS boss emphasized that the integration was “a marathon, not a sprint.” The year 2024 will be a crucial year for the big bank. The most important priorities for the first half of the year include the merger of the two parent companies and the transfer of the US business into a single intermediate holding company.
Compensation report is accepted with 83.5 percent
After comments and criticism from shareholders, the remuneration report received approval of 83.5 percent at the meeting. Sergio Ermotti’s remuneration is therefore also approved. In March it was announced that the bank boss had earned 14.4 million francs in the nine months after taking over Credit Suisse.
“Clear sign”: assessment of the SRF business editor
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The clock shows 1:53 when the vote finally takes place. The UBS general meeting in Basel has been running since 10:30 a.m. Before the vote, the votes of the more or less angry shareholders revolved around the takeover of Credit Suisse, the mistakes in the past, sustainability and – above all and again and again – the remuneration of CEO Sergio Ermotti in the amount of 14.4 million francs. The shareholders have been voting on the remuneration report in a consultative manner since the law was amended following the adoption of the rip-off initiative. The result is therefore not binding, but it is a barometer of the mood. And that showed something today. While the annual report was approved with 99 percent and the sustainability report, which was also criticized (also consultative, non-binding), received 93 percent approval, the remuneration report was only around 84 percent. There have already been lower approval ratings at general meetings, but in the case of UBS it is a clear sign when 16 percent of the shareholders reject the remuneration report. Will that have an effect? It is highly doubtful that the top management at UBS will therefore be encouraged to change the culture in its remuneration practices. But 16 percent rejection has symbolic value.
Matthias Pfander
According to Board Chairman Colm Kelleher, Ermotti’s compensation was justified given the turbulent takeover of Credit Suisse. “The Board of Directors is honoring Ermotti’s outstanding performance in the most important year in UBS history. He has fulfilled probably the most difficult task in the industry.”
Legend: Integration is “a marathon, not a sprint,” emphasized UBS boss Sergio Ermotti at the general meeting in Basel. Keystone / GEORGIOS KEFALAS
In an advisory vote, shareholders also approved the bank’s sustainability report with a yes vote of 93.4 percent. In his vote, Chairman of the Board of Directors Kelleher referred to what he believes are the bank’s ambitious sustainability goals.
UBS wants to close 85 bank branches after the takeover
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On March 19, 2023, UBS will take over the major bank Credit Suisse. Since then, the merger has been taking place in partial steps. In March 2024 it became known that UBS wanted to close 85 CS branches. Locations where UBS and CS branches are directly next to each other are affected.
These are the locations Mendrisio in southern Ticino, Delémont in the canton of Jura, Rheinfelden and Frick in the canton of Aargau and Grenchen in Solothurn. UBS says it wants to gain “experience” from these five branches. Between July and September 2024, another “around 20 locations will be consolidated,” according to UBS.
In his speech, the UBS CEO criticized the argument that UBS had an implicit state guarantee as “factually incorrect”. He referred to UBS’s loss-absorbing capital totaling around $200 billion. “UBS’s risks are borne by shareholders, and by holders of AT1 instruments and loss-absorbing TLAC bonds – not by taxpayers.”
According to Kelleher, UBS is not “too big to fail”
At the meeting, UBS President Colm Kelleher once again spoke out against additional capital requirements for the big bank. According to the text of his speech, the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the major Swiss bank said that he was “seriously concerned” about some of the discussions in connection with additional capital requirements. “The capital requirements for globally systemically important banks have increased significantly over the past 15 years,” emphasized Kelleher. In his opinion, UBS is also not “too big to fail”.
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Economic growth in the Caucasus and Central Asia will remain robust in 2024
– 2024-04-24 13:53:50
Economic growth in the Caucasus and Central Asia will remain robust in 2024.
As Day.Az reported on Thursday, the director of the IMF’s Middle East and Central Asia Department, Jihad Azur, said this today during a briefing at the IMF Spring Meetings in Washington.
“Growth in the Middle East and North Africa is constrained by conflicts, lower oil production, trade disruptions and high debt. Risks are exceptionally high. Growth in the Caucasus and Central Asia remains robust, supported by positive trade and financial flows. Growth in countries is expected “The Caucasus and Central Asia will be 3.9 percent in 2024 and 4.8 percent in 2025, and in the countries of the Middle East and North Africa – 2.7 percent in 2024 and 4.2 percent in 2025,” he said.
Azure noted that even 10 years after major conflict, per capita income in the Middle East and Central Asia remains about 10 percent lower than in other conflict-affected countries.
“An uneven recovery is expected in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as in the Caucasus and Central Asia. While inflation is falling in most countries in line with global trends, growth prospects vary across countries. Starting in the Middle East and North Africa, the conflict in Gaza and Israel has caused enormous suffering. In addition, disruptions to shipping in the Red Sea have exacerbated existing vulnerabilities,” said the IMF Department Director.
Conflicts are negatively impacting activity in some fragile, low-income countries, he added.
“Our analysis shows that the conflict not only results in long-term human and social costs, but can also lead to large and permanent losses in output, with potential consequences for other countries. We forecast that economic growth in the Caucasus and Central Asia will remain robust this year In addition, the reorientation of trade changes trade in the Caucasus and Central Asia region,” Azur said.
He noted that the second problem is inflation.
“Inflation is falling in line with global trends and is approaching historical trends in many economies, with about 1/3 of countries now near or below average, and monetary tightening cycles appear to have ended in most economies. Next year, in the Caucasus and Central Asia, inflation will be below the target or close to it. Inflation is projected to decrease from 7.7 percent in 2024 to 7.1 percent next year,” said the director of the IMF Department.
It should be noted that on April 15, the Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group started in Washington.
Major ministerial meetings and events will be held April 17-19, and other meetings will be held April 15-20.
Key events include meetings of the Development Committee and the International Monetary and Financial Committee of the IMF, which discuss the progress of the work of the World Bank Group and the IMF.
The Spring Meetings bring together central bankers, finance and development ministers, parliamentarians, private sector representatives, civil society organizations and academics to discuss issues of global concern, including the global economy, poverty eradication, and economic development.
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Economic growth in the Caucasus and Central Asia will remain robust in 2024 – 2024-04-24 13:53:50
Life with loans and poverty for 7 out of 10 wage earners
– 2024-04-24 14:19:46
Even households with two workers are unable to meet their basic needs
Life with dignity: the central slogan during the strike mobilization of private sector employees last Wednesday. The question arises effortlessly. How is it possible that the world of wage labor is demanding a “life with dignity” by demonstrating and striking at the same time that the prime minister declares that “Greece is a country with an amazing quality of life”? How is the image of the ministers celebrating and admiring themselves because from April 1st the minimum wage was increased to 830 euros connected with this 17 days later, when employees are taking to the streets to demand wage increases that will allow them to live with dignity? This is where the elements come in and boom. Most Greek households, more than 65%, live a “life of survival” in a country where the cost of living crisis is due to the profiteering inflation that inflates day by day to profit the cartels and profit through indirect taxes (VAT ) the GDP.
Even in the pool of the Delphi Forum, where the domestic political system is washed away and the participating ministers are praised for their “successes”, the problem could not be swept under the carpet. Moderating a related discussion, the professor of Management, Science and Technology at the Athens University of Economics and Business Giorgos Doukidis highlighted what is happening in front of the supermarket shelves. Where the dignity of the Greeks is being trampled on because their wallets cannot afford to take what they need:
- 2/3 of income is spent on bills, rent and taxes.
- 2/3 of consumers in Greece spend 90% of their income on basic goods.
- 36% feel insecure.
- 29% feel anger and 20% fear.
- Four out of ten consider that they will reduce purchases in the next six months.
On the edge of survival
The picture is nothing short of dystopian. At least 66.6% of households in Greece are suffocating from the cost of living crisis. Especially for wage earners the money they earn from their work does not allow them to live decently.
But what is the picture of the world of wage labor in Greece? According to the data of the ERGANI system, the average salary for 2023 was close to 1,250 euros per month. Because in Greece we are paid with 14 salaries, the annual earnings amount to 17,500 euros. Mind you, this is the gross salary. If we deduct the income tax (1,299 euros) and the insurance contributions (2,427 euros), a net salary (annual 13,774 euros) remains of the order of 984 euros per month. The average wage earner in Greece has to live with these. Even if the spouse also works and receives the average salary – a rare event – the family income from salaried work amounts to 27,548 euros per year.
Soaring expenses
As defined, reasonable living expenses include the goods and services that households consume and are classified into four groups according to how necessary they are for living: basic needs, food, durable goods and travel – leisure.
According to the relevant data of ELSTAT, for a family of four they amount to between 18,000 and 20,000 euros per year. However, reasonable living expenses do not include housing. If a family of four rents, the cost of living reaches unimaginable figures. According to the relevant search platforms, a two-bedroom apartment in an apartment building built in the 1970s in Pagrati is rented for around 800 euros per month. It is a district of Athens where a middle-income family lives. Rents are at the same levels in most districts of Athens. This means that another 10,000 euros must be added to the costs.
As it turns out, reasonable living expenses, including rent, reach 30,000 euros per year, not counting extraordinary expenses (emerging health problems, etc.). The average income of a family of four with both parents working amounts to 27,548 euros per year and is 2,500 euros short of reasonable living expenses. What do they all do to survive in the country with the amazing, according to Kyriakos Mitsotakis, quality of life? According to a study by Intrum, almost three out of ten consumers in Greece spend more than their monthly income, with the average overspending estimated at 275 euros. The money comes either from savings or from cards or from loans…
53.6% of employees earn less than €1,000
The environment in relation to reasonable living expenses, which do not decrease according to salary earnings, becomes suffocating if one is below the zone of 1,000 euros gross. It would not be a problem if, according to the ERGANI system, 53.68% of the country’s employees, which amount to a total of 2.29 million workers, do not belong to this zone. Another 373,163 (ie 16.25%) are paid between 1,001 and 1,200 euros. Life on loans, then, because Mitsotakis wants to feed the cartels with obscene profits and celebrate tax-inducing growth.
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Life with loans and poverty for 7 out of 10 wage earners – 2024-04-24 14:19:46