UBS hit by charge for Paine Webber

UBS Warburg, the Swiss investment bank, yesterday revealed it had made its first quarterly loss, of 101m Swiss francs (£46m), in four years as poor markets and a Sfr953m write down in its US broking business hit earnings.

The post-tax non-cash write down from withdrawing the Paine Webber brand in the US put UBS's net profits for the year at Sfr3.5bn, a drop of 29 per cent on 2001. Its fourth-quarter Sfr101m loss compares with a Sfr1.1bn profit in the same period in 2001.

UBS bought Paine Webber for $11.5bn (£7.2bn) in 2000 and stated at the time it would drop the brand name behind the US's fourth-largest broker. The bank also said in November it would ditch Warburg from its name, and the whole company would be branded UBS.

Peter Wuffli, chief executive, had few words of optimism that market conditions would improve the company's fortunes, saying he did not see any immediate pick up in the company's financial performance. "Any recovery in the latter part of this year remains simply unpredictable," he said.

Operating income in 2002 fell 8 per cent, as the bank suffered from a lack of investor appetite, less buoyant trading conditions and ongoing losses in its private-equity business.