Ironically, UBS was praised as being conservative as the credit crunch got underway with it’s first $3 billion write down at the end of last year. Now the bank stands as the poster-child for mortgage-related beatings with write downs totaling $37 billion, and is downsizing and pulling out of several higher-risk banking enterprises in an attempt to save itself as a going concern.

From Market Watch on the UBS mortgage losses it reads the following "the Swiss investment-banking giant, swung to a first-quarter net loss of 11.54 billion Swiss francs ($11 billion) after posting some $19 billion of losses tied to U.S. mortgages and related securities as well as other structured products."

On the 5,500 job cuts at UBS by 2009

UBS said Tuesday it plans to cut 5,500 jobs by the middle of next year, an effort meant to restructure the Swiss giant’s troubled investment bank. The Zurich-based bank will axe the jobs after massive write-downs on dud mortgage securities, totaling over $37 billion thus far.

It’s no wonder the bank is under investigation for improperly valuing its assets. $3 billion was touted as a purging of the system when UBS first came forward. Now with losses at 10x it looks more like fraud.

Source: By Blown Mortgage