Zurich  - UBS, the troubled Swiss banking giant, confirmed reports Thursday that it was in the process of cutting 2,000 jobs in its wealth management division in the United States.

"This part of the headcount reduction initiative," said a UBS spokesman in Switzerland.

The company, the largest manager of wealth in the world, announced earlier this month that it will take a first-quarter loss of almost 2

billion Swiss francs (1.7 billion dollars) and cut 8,700 jobs worldwide by 2010, including over 2,000 in its base of Switzerland.

Zurich - A day after announcing surprising first quarter profits of about 2 billion Swiss francs (1.7 billion dollars), the chairman of Credit Suisse said Friday his bank was on the path to recovery.

"We believe that despite our 2008 loss, Credit Suisse is today better positioned than it was 12 months ago," Walter B. Kielholz told shareholders.

The bank lost 8.2 billion francs in 2008, the largest in Credit Suisse's history but has not required a state capital injection or a bail-out, unlike its closest competitor UBS.

Zurich  - Credit Suisse said Tuesday it would compensate more clients who invested in Lehman Brothers' financial products, which have lost all their value since the investment bank's collapse last September.

A deal was reached with the Swiss consumer group Federation Romande des Consommateurs for clients who had assets up to 500,000 Swiss francs (427,758 dollars) as of August 31 last year and had invested over 20 per cent of those assets in capital-protected Lehman products.

Zurich - UBS announced Monday it had agreed to sell its Brazilian financial services business, UBS Pactual, for approximately 2.5 billion dollars to BTG Investments, in an attempt to raise capital.

In a statement the Swiss bank said the sale, which would result in a "small loss," was part of a strategy to reduce its risk profile and improve its balance sheet.

Also, the sale will strengthen by 1.3 billion dollars its Tier 1 capital, which had been slipping in recent months, UBS said. The tier 1 capital ratio is considered an important indicator of a bank's financial strength

Zurich  - Blood doping in Austria, and elsewhere, was an open secret in the cycling community, the former advisor of ex-Tour de France champion Jan Ullrich said in an interview published on Thursday.

Speaking in the wake of allegations that a Vienna blood bank was part of a doping scheme in Austria, Rudy Pevenage told Swiss daily Neue Zuercher Zeitung (NZZ) that "many in cycling knew three years ago that there was a nest in Vienna."

Zurich  - The Swiss banking giant UBS said Wednesday it will take a first-quarter loss of almost 2 billion Swiss francs (1.7 billion dollars) and will cut 8,700 jobs worldwide by 2010.

"Unfortunately I am not able, as yet, to offer you any good news," Oswald Grubel, chief executive officer of the UBS Group, told shareholders at the annual meeting while pledging to return to profitability.

The crisis, he said, "was not over," and would likely lead UBS to being a smaller bank. Previously at the UBS rival Credit Suisse, Grubel took over his role in February.