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UBS (ticker: UBS) stated its technique stays unchanged and the addition of Credit score Suisse ( CS ) will strengthen its skill to serve shoppers globally. The mixture helps our development ambitions within the Americas and Asia, whereas including scale to our operations in Europe, and we sit up for welcoming our new prospects and colleagues around the globe within the coming weeks, CEO Ralph Hamers stated in a press release.

The sheer measurement of the 2 banks, in addition to the burden of their integration, might immediate some shoppers to look elsewhere, maybe to smaller Swiss managers resembling Pictet & Cie or Julius Baer (BAER. Switzerland). U.S. wealth managers resembling Morgan Stanley ( MS ) may additionally be scooping up rich shoppers, trade advisers say.

The combo can be a behemoth, however not a nimble or engaging participant for most of the ultra-wealthy, stated Bob Casey, an unbiased wealth administration advisor. Wealthy households hate financial institution mergers.

S&P World Rankings revised its outlook on UBS to damaging on Monday and expects the Credit score Suisse merger to pose dangers. The score company confirmed the credit standing of UBS A-issuer.

Though the 2 companies are each world asset managers, they don’t overlap within the U.S. Credit score Suisse closed its U.S. wealth administration unit in 2016, whereas UBS has sharpened its U.S. technique to offer excessive internet value and ultra-high internet value shoppers. UBS has greater than 6,000 monetary advisers in its Americas unit, which incorporates the US in addition to a small variety of advisers in Canada and Latin America.

For UBS, Credit score Suisses’ non-US wealth administration enterprise is an enormous acquisition, offered it could hold Credit score Suisses advisers and shoppers, who in latest weeks might have been weighing whether or not to ditch rival wealth managers. Some shoppers have in all probability already drawn cash from Credit score Suisse. UBS ought to act shortly to stipulate the advantages of the merger to Credit score Suisse advisers, says Alois Pirker, CEO of wealth administration consultancy Pirker Companions. Pirker says elite advisers who’ve relationships with rich shoppers are in demand in nearly each market.

UBS wants to inform a narrative to advisers the agency needs to maintain, and they should inform it quickly, he says.

The corporate may additionally want to supply consultants retention bonuses to remain after the merger.

Earlier wealth administration acquisitions have been marred when rivals tried to rent advisers from the acquired agency, a dynamic with which UBS and Credit score Suisse are already acquainted. When Credit score Suisse closed its US wealth administration unit in 2016, it sought to switch its almost 300 US-based advisers to Wells Fargo
.

UBS and different rivals swooped in and recruited many Credit score Suisse advisers who would have in any other case ended up at Wells Fargo.

UBS may even face a long-term problem of whether or not to combine the companies’ platforms or just switch Credit score Suisses’ advisers and shoppers to UBS. Integrating completely different methods and applied sciences might be difficult and take years, says Pirker. He expects that UBS will desire to easily switch Credit score Suisse’s advisers and shoppers to its platform.

UBS is a well-oiled machine, he says. Why would they begin disassembling this machine and reassembling it in any other case? That would not make a lot sense.

Swiss regulators tried over the weekend to type out the ustakeover after Credit score Suisse noticed money outflows final week and its valuation fell. The deal averts the collapse of Credit score Suisse and its potential ripple results, however the hasty marriage may even reshape the worldwide banking panorama, which can create new challenges.

Traders initially appeared skeptical concerning the worth of the deal for UBS. Shares fell greater than 15% in Zurich buying and selling on Monday earlier than recovering these losses to finish the session up 1.3%. Shares of US-listed banks have been buying and selling 4.5% larger on the finish of the session.

The deal offers UBS Credit score Suisses funding financial institution and retail banking unit in Switzerland. UBS stated the acquisition would make it the most important financial institution in Switzerland by way of buyer deposits and loans.

Analysts had blended reactions. UBS was downgraded to Underperform from Market Carry out at Keefe Bruyette. The financial institution was upgraded to Purchase from Impartial at Financial institution of America.

The deal is more likely to improve worth for UBS and its shareholders, given the deeply discounted value and draw back safety afforded UBS to hold out the required restructuring, stated Firdaus Ibrahim, an analyst at CFRA Analysis who maintained a score Maintain on to the inventory.

Johann Scholtz, fairness analyst at Morningstar, wrote that UBS might derive worth from the acquisition. It’s in a a lot better place to hold out a radical restructuring of Credit score Suisse’s companies than Credit score Suisse was, Scholtz wrote in a March 19 observe.

There are a couple of points of the deal that buyers should be attempting to make sense of. The primary is the velocity of Credit score Suisses collapse, the lack of confidence within the financial institution prompted increasingly prospects to withdraw their money, making a self-reinforcing spiral of catastrophe that additional broken the well being of the 167-year-old establishment.

The ultimate sale value of about $3 billion in inventory can be unusual. Credit score Suisse had a market capitalization of greater than $7 billion on the finish of final week, even after shares had fallen for months.

Beneficiant authorities ensures for UBSa’s greater than $100 billion liquidity line from the central financial institution and a Swiss authorities loss assure of almost $10 billion might depart merchants questioning what the authorities noticed that made the transaction so pressing.

As well as, a pool of bonds totaling about $17 billion, so-called further bonds, or AT1s, referred to as Contingent Convertible bonds or Cocos at different banks, disappeared with the deal.

The Cocos are likely to pay larger rates of interest as a result of they convert to fairness if sure circumstances are met, and the Credit score Suisses have been written off solely, though shareholders received some compensation for the buyout.

That is an thrilling improvement on condition that even unsecured bondholders usually rank above fairness holders within the capital construction, Louis Gave of Gavekal Analysis stated in a observe. So for fairness holders to get one thing and CoCo bondholders to get nothing raises critical questions concerning the true worth of CoCo bonds.

European Union regulators issued a press release on Monday saying that, within the EU, Cocos would solely incur losses after frequent inventory holders.

Though Credit score Suisses issues have been largely of its personal making, the collapse of Silicon Valley Financial institution this month offered the spark that despatched prospects speeding to withdraw their deposits. The query now for buyers and prospects is whether or not this merger will work.

Write to Andrew Welsch at andrew.welsch@barrons.com and Brian Swint at brian.swint@barrons.com