Peter Wuffli

Dr. Peter A. Wuffli (born 26 October 1957 in Zürich) was appointed President of the Group Executive Board of UBS AG in December 2001 and Group Chief Executive Officer in September 2003. Previously, he was Chairman and CEO of UBS Asset Management and, before that, UBS AG Group Chief Financial Officer.^[1]

From 1994 to 1998, he was the Chief Financial Officer at SBC and a member of SBC's Group Executive Board in Basel. There he met Marcel Ospel, and together they rose to top positions with the new UBS AG after the 1998 merger.

In 1984, he joined McKinsey & Co as management consultant and in 1990 became a partner of McKinsey Switzerland's senior management. He started his professional life, while studying at University of St. Gallen, writing about economics for the Neue Zürcher Zeitung.

He is a Swiss citizen and a graduate of the University of St. Gallen (1981, doctorate 1984) and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (1989). He and his wife Susanna have three children. His hobby is opera, and he is said to enjoy taking "dips into ordinary life".

His father Heinz R. Wuffli was General Director of Credit Suisse from 1967 to 1977, when he resigned due to his involvement in the Chiasso affair.^[2]

Wuffli left as a CEO UBS AG on 6 July 2007.^[3] He has renounced about $10 million in payments.^[4]

Other engagements

In December 2006 Wuffli and his wife founded The Elea Foundation for Ethics in Globalization.^[5]

He is a Board member of the Zurich Opera House,^[6] member of the Executive Committee of the Institute of International Finance Inc, Washington DC, member of the Executive Committee and Vice Chairman of the Board of IMD International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne and Vice Chairman of the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce in Zurich.

He was president of the Friends of the FDP (Freunde der FDP) association , founded 2004 to support the Swiss FDP political party, which he has been a member of since his youth.

Quotes

He announced that executive salaries at UBS AG were rising, on average, by 21 percent.

• "UBS recognizes that very serious mistakes were made."
  –after UBS AG was fined on May 10, 2004, $100 million by the U.S. Federal Reserve for illegally transferring dollars from a Fed deposit – an account set up by the Fed in a commercial bank – at UBS AG to Iran, Cuba and other countries under a U.S. trade embargo.
• "I understand that many ask critical questions about whether high profits and job cuts are justifiable. I do not get a bad conscience about that, I am pleased about UBS's success."
  –in an interview with the weekly SonntagsZeitung, 2004
• "A banker is, naturally, not liked." ("Ein Banker ist von Natur aus nicht beliebt.")
  –in an interview with the weekly Weltwoche 16/03
• "I am proud of what I do and I am proud if we have successes."
  –in an interview with Swissinfo November 7, 2002
• "We do have an erosion of confidence and I think if you go back in history every bubble has basically led to abuses, to fraud, to unethical behaviour and we’re seeing the same."
  –in an interview with Swissinfo, November 7, 2002
• "The question is: whom do you compare an executive with? Traditionally an executive is compared with a fixed wage employee. ... We should ... compare them much more with entrepreneurs than with fixed-wage salaries."
  –in an interview with Swissinfo, November 7, 2002
• "A company is only as ethical as its people."

References