UBS lifts junior banker pay for a second time

Bloomberg

UBS Group AG increased pay for junior bankers in the US for a second time in less than a year, bringing the Swiss lender in line with Wall Street rivals trying to stem defections amid a race for talent.
UBS increased base salaries for first-year analysts to $110,000, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified discussing private information. The bank already lifted pay for junior bankers in the US to $100,000 effective from August, Bloomberg News reported last year.
As the pandemic delivered windfalls — and long hours of toil — across Wall Street, major US banks began lifting junior-banker pay in a bid to retain younger staff weighed down by work. Citigroup Inc boosted first-year analyst salaries to $110,000 earlier this year after investment-banking revenue soared in 2021. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised junior bankers’ pay to the same level in January, the second increase in seven months. The pay increase was first reported
earlier by Financial News.
In May of last year, Bloomberg reported that UBS will pay a $40,000 one-time bonus to its global banking analysts when they are promoted.
Meanwhile, UBS wealth management unit launched a group for investment strategies related to diversity and inclusion, with its goal to generate both social benefits and returns.
The team will offer investments that focus on promoting equality, expanding opportunities and improving outcomes for underrepresented or marginalised groups, the Zurich-based bank’s wealth management unit said.
The inclusive investing group, led by Karen Sunderam, will offer ways for clients to steer their money towards asset-management firms that are partly owned by minorities and products led by portfolio managers that self-identify as such, including women, racial or ethnic minorities, veterans, and people with disabilities.
Wealth managers like UBS are seeing growing demand among clients for investment choices that align with personal values and social good. Firms are responding with products tailored for environmental, social and governance factors, fueling a boom in
the ESG market, which Bloomberg Intelligence estimates will surpass $50 trillion by 2025.
Whether retail investors or ultra-high-net-worth individuals, “they’ve told us what they want,” Lynette Jefferson, head of sustainable and inclusive investing solutions at UBS Global Wealth Management, said in an interview. “They have been very specific about the types of investments that they’re looking for to promote social objectives.”
Other large banks have also carved out groups within their wealth-management divisions that invest with diversity and inclusion in mind.