Credit Suisse Group AG yesterday said that business in the fourth quarter so far has continued the trend of the previous three months, when the lender got a boost from advising on deals while trading revenue trailed peers.
The investment bank “continues to perform well,” with revenue higher than in last year’s fourth quarter, Credit Suisse said in a statement on its investor day.
In wealth management, stronger transactional business especially in Asia is offsetting headwinds from the stronger Swiss franc and negative interest rates, it said.
Photo: Reuters
The bank confirmed a target for a return on tangible equity of 10 to 12 percent in the medium-term and for capital distributions, while cautioning that reaching that goal next year would depend on provisions for bad loans.
Credit Suisse chief executive Thomas Gottstein is seeking to turn the corner after a series of setbacks overshadowed his first year in office, from loan losses to questionable dealings for a large client.
While he simplified the organizational setup, including at the securities unit, and started a review of the asset management business, he has been unable to stop a constant flow of bad news.
In the latest hit, an impairment on a hedge fund stake and potentially surging legal provisions threaten to affect fourth-quarter earnings.
Since Gottstein combined the investment banking and trading activities in one unit, the business has shown mixed results, with advisory doing well in the third quarter, while fixed-income trading — the largest revenue contributor — trailed peers.
The bank did not give any details on its trading performance so far this quarter.
The heads of the two largest US lenders, JPMorgan Chase & Co and Bank of America Corp, last week told investors that their investment-banking and trading divisions would notch a strong performance in the fourth quarter as economic activity stayed fairly resilient.
At Deutsche Bank AG, fixed-income trading grew 10 percent in October and 23 percent last month.
The COVID-19 pandemic also exposed some weaknesses in Credit Suisse’s asset management model, a business that is typically a source of stable income with little risk for the bank, but which suffered a number of fund implosions this year as well as a scandal involving one of its largest clients, Softbank Group Corp.
Credit Suisse said that it expects a significant turnaround at the unit next year.
On Ireland’s blustery western seaboard, researchers are gleefully flying giant kites — not for fun, but in the hope of generating renewable electricity and sparking a “revolution” in wind energy. “We use a kite to capture the wind and a generator at the bottom of it that captures the power,” said Padraic Doherty of Kitepower, the Dutch firm behind the venture. At its test site in operation since September 2023 near the small town of Bangor Erris, the team transports the vast 60-square-meter kite from a hangar across the lunar-like bogland to a generator. The kite is then attached by a
Foxconn Technology Co (鴻準精密), a metal casing supplier owned by Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), yesterday announced plans to invest US$1 billion in the US over the next decade as part of its business transformation strategy. The Apple Inc supplier said in a statement that its board approved the investment on Thursday, as part of a transformation strategy focused on precision mold development, smart manufacturing, robotics and advanced automation. The strategy would have a strong emphasis on artificial intelligence (AI), the company added. The company said it aims to build a flexible, intelligent production ecosystem to boost competitiveness and sustainability. Foxconn
Leading Taiwanese bicycle brands Giant Manufacturing Co (巨大機械) and Merida Industry Co (美利達工業) on Sunday said that they have adopted measures to mitigate the impact of the tariff policies of US President Donald Trump’s administration. The US announced at the beginning of this month that it would impose a 20 percent tariff on imported goods made in Taiwan, effective on Thursday last week. The tariff would be added to other pre-existing most-favored-nation duties and industry-specific trade remedy levy, which would bring the overall tariff on Taiwan-made bicycles to between 25.5 percent and 31 percent. However, Giant did not seem too perturbed by the
TARIFF CONCERNS: Semiconductor suppliers are tempering expectations for the traditionally strong third quarter, citing US tariff uncertainty and a stronger NT dollar Several Taiwanese semiconductor suppliers are taking a cautious view of the third quarter — typically a peak season for the industry — citing uncertainty over US tariffs and the stronger New Taiwan dollar. Smartphone chip designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科技) said that customers accelerated orders in the first half of the year to avoid potential tariffs threatened by US President Donald Trump’s administration. As a result, it anticipates weaker-than-usual peak-season demand in the third quarter. The US tariff plan, announced on April 2, initially proposed a 32 percent duty on Taiwanese goods. Its implementation was postponed by 90 days to July 9, then
RSS