Power Struggle Brewing at UBS

A recent UBS leadership appointment at the very top of the bank continues to provoke internal resentment.

There is likely a tug-of-war going on at Switzerland’s largest bank. The ostensible trigger is the current group chief financial officer Sarah Youngwood. She has been under criticism for a while now and questions are increasingly circulating about her competence.

That fact weighs even more heavily now after it has become common knowledge inside UBS that her application had been rejected by the board of directors several times. When asked, a spokesperson for the bank said: That claim is entirely false.

According to internal sources, it appears that the US-French dual citizen Youngwood got the top job in the finance department because of the backing of CEO Ralph Hamers.

Apparently, he managed to push through his external candidate given the strength of his position to the dissatisfaction of a number of board members and even some top executives. A UBS spokesperson refuted the claims and indicated: «These rumors have no basis in fact.

There continues to be resentment at the highest levels of UBS to this day given Youngwood’s appointment in May 2022. At the same time, Hamers finds himself in an increasingly precarious position, even if UBS officially continues to deny this. From the point of view of certain top executives, doubts have arisen about Hamers related to all this.