As of: February 1, 2024, 9:52 a.m
By: Marcel Reich
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The Swiss bank Julius Baer is sliding into crisis.
© Ennio Leanza/dpa
Julius Baer is facing upheaval: the CEO has to leave and a massive write-down is affecting the balance sheet.
The reason is also the commitment to Signa.
Munich - The investment in René Benko's real estate empire Signa has far-reaching consequences for the Swiss private bank Julius Baer: CEO Philipp Rickenbacher will leave the company and be replaced by deputy head and chief operating officer (COO) Nic Dreckmann on an interim basis.
This is reported by the
Handelsblatt
.
In addition to this change in leadership, Julius Baer is writing off loans amounting to 586 million Swiss francs (approximately 628 million euros) granted to various Signa Group companies.
This information was announced on Thursday when the annual figures were presented.
David Nicol, head of the risk committee on the board of directors, will not stand for re-election at the upcoming general meeting.
Earthquake at Julius Baer: Investors may be surprised
The write-off has a significant impact on the bank's annual profit: the group's profit falls by 55 percent to 454 million Swiss francs.
Analysts had forecast a profit of around 800 million francs - many had expected a further write-down of the Signa loans of 300 million francs after Julius Baer had already set aside an additional 70 million for the commitment at the end of November last year.
It comes as a surprise to many investors that Julius Baer is completely writing off the loans, some of which are secured by real estate investments.
The losses were incurred in a division known as “private debt,” in which Julius Baer offers complex structured loans to wealthy clients.
Romeo Lacher, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Julius Baer, said: "On behalf of the entire Board of Directors, I express my deep regret that the full impairment of the largest exposure in our private debt business has significantly impacted our consolidated profit for 2023."