Swiss bank loses €6.8bn over subprime crisis

Swiss bank UBS has announced €6.8bn in losses due to exposure to the US subprime mortgage crisis.

The bank, which is the biggest in Europe in terms of its assets, obtained emergency funds from the Government of Singapore and an unnamed Middle East investor.

The scale of these losses came as a bolt from the blue for investors.

UBS has also issued a profits warning and scrapped plans to pay shareholders a dividend.

The $10bn charge is one of the biggest writedowns by any global bank since the crisis broke.

UBS has ran so short of money it has had to sell 9% of the bank to investors.

The Government of Singapore and a Middle East investor poured in €7bn.

There is a message today is that the full scale of exposure of banks to the US mortgage fiasco is still emerging.