UBS said most of the 3,500 staff it plans to eliminate were notified in the third quarter and cautioned analysts against assuming that there will be large future layoffs.
Analysts have speculated that UBS will announce further firings at its investors' day November 17. As previously announced, UBS plans to reduce its cost base by two billion frances by 2013 and shrink its investment bank while re-focusing on its wealth management business.
During the bank's conference call to discuss third quarter results, Chief Financial Officer Tom Naratil warned analysts not to assume more cuts when calculating earnings estimates. "You seemed to assume that we would announce reductions in staff at our investor day and I wouldn't want you to go into that with that assumption," he said in response to a question from Matt Spick, a banking analyst with Deutsche Bank.
Of the announced reductions, 45% will come from the investment bank, 35% from wealth management and Swiss bank, 10% from global asset management and 10% from wealth management Americas. The bank won't shed financial advisors, it said.
"Our goal is to continue to be the preeminent wealth management franchise in the world together with a very strong presence in Switzerland in our core businesses," said Sergio Ermotti, the interim chief executive. "We want to have a strong, profitable investment bank and asset management business to support that strategy."
The firm had 65,921 employees at the end of the third quarter, an increase of 214 from last quarter.
The firm set aside 1.3 billion Swiss francs in personnel expenses for the investment bank, down 11% from the second quarter's pool. The firm has set aside 4.7 billion Swiss francs for investment banking compensation for the first nine months of 2011, down 13.7% percent from the year earlier period.
Across the bank, profit fell 39% to 1.02 billion Swiss francs for the third quarter from 1.67 billion francs a year earlier.
Write to Julie Steinberg at Julie.Steinberg@dowjones.com