UBS investigated over US tax evasion

UBS has today confirmed it is involved in a fresh investigation by American authorities after it allegedly sold products to help US citizens evade tax.

The Swiss bank said it is being investigated for selling “bearer bonds” and other unregistered securities, which are banned in the US.

Last month it received inquiries from the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York and from the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

The bank said: “We are cooperating with the authorities in these investigations”.

This comes after UBS was fined more than £233m ($354m, €313m) for failing to manage risks surrounding G10 spot foreign exchange (FX) trading in November. It was one of five banks included in a record fine dished out by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

HSBC was also fined by the FCA for FX trading failings and, it was announced yesterday, is currently under investigation for helping its clients evade tax.

In 2009, UBS admitted helping Americans evade US taxes and paid a $780m fine after it was investigated by the US Justice Department.

It said its subsidiaries, including UBS Luxembourg, have been investigated by a number of regulators concerning two third-party funds established under Luxembourg law, which now face “severe losses”.

“Strong third quarter”

According to the group’s fourth quarter and full year results released today, UBS Wealth Management reported a 4% increase in profit before tax to CHF2.5bn for the full year, in part driven by its highest net new money inflows in Asia Pacific region since 2007.

Over the same period, the group’s Wealth Management Americas division achieved a record year, producing just over $1bn.

In the fourth quarter, the wealth management division achieved pre-tax profits of CHF694m on the back of both higher net interest and recurring fee income.

This improvement reflected recent initiatives by the group to grow lending and mortgage balances and increase mandate penetration. It was also the result of higher invested assets.

These increases were offset by declines in transaction-based income, which fell, the group said: “after a very strong third quarter”.

“Net new money flows from clients in Asia Pacific, ultra high net worth clients globally and clients of the domestic business in Europe remained buoyant, but were partly offset by expected cross-border outflows in Europe,” UBS said.

In total, UBS saw CHF3bn in net new money.

At a group level, UBS reported CHF963m in net profit attributable to shareholders, for the quarter. For the year to end 2014, UBS reported a 13% jump in net profit to CHF3.6bn. The group also doubled its ordinary dividend to CHF0.5

In a letter to shareholders, chair, Axel Weber and chief executive Sergio Emotti said: “At the start of the first quarter of 2015, many of the underlying challenges and geopolitical issues that we have previously highlighted remain.

“The mixed outlook for global growth, the absence of sustained and credible improvements to unresolved issues in Europe, continuing US fiscal and monetary policy issues, increasing geopolitical instability and greater uncertainty surrounding the potential effects of lower and potentially volatile energy and other commodity prices would make improvements in prevailing market conditions unlikely.”