Peter Wuffli

Peter Wuffli
Peter Wuffli in May 2005 at the 35. St. Gallen Symposium
Born	(1957-10-26) October 26, 1957 Zürich, Canton of Zürich
Nationality	Swiss
Alma mater	University of St. Gallen Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania
Occupation	Banker

Peter A. Wuffli (born 26 October 1957) is a Swiss businessman who was appointed president and chief executive officer of UBS AG in December 2001 after serving as the chef executive of UBS Asset Management and the company's chief financial officer.

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 has also attended the Advanced Management Program at Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (1989). He and his wife Susanna have three children. His hobby is opera.

His father Heinz R. Wuffli was General Director of Credit Suisse from 1967 to 1977, when he resigned as a consequence of the Chiasso affair.

The UBS Board fired Wuffli on 6 July 2007. He has renounced about $10 million in payments.

Other engagements

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

He is Chairman of the Board of Partners Group Holding, a Board member of the Zurich Opera House, member of the Executive Committee and Chairman of the Board of IMD International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne.

He was president of the Friends of the FDP (Freunde der FDP) association [1], 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. [2]
• "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."

Publications

• Liberale Ethik. Orientierungsversuch im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Stämpfli Verlag, Bern 2010, ISBN 978-3-7272-1308-3
• Inclusive Leadership, A Framework for the Global Era. Springer 2016, ISBN 978-3-319-23560-8