Ethos Foundation condemns CEO pay at largest Swiss banks

Ethos Foundation has condemned high pay for chief executive officers at large Swiss banks including UBS, Julius Baer, and EFG International. 

Chief executive remuneration at the largest listed banks in Switzerland reached “record levels” in 2025, far above the limit set by the Swiss pension fund-backed organisation, it said.

The CEO of UBS, Sergio Ermotti, received CHF14.9m (€16m), EFG International’s chief executive officer Giorgio Pradelli CHF9.6m, and Stefan Bollinger, joining Julius Baer from Goldman Sachs as the new CEO in January last year, CHF23.1m. 

Bollinger’s remuneration package includes CHF14.8m replacement awards for compensation forfeited as a result of his resignation from Goldman Sachs, according to the bank’s remuneration report.  

The three CEOs are among the highest-paid bankers in continental Europe, where bank bonuses are capped since 2014 at twice the base salary. The European Union introduced the the bonus cap in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis to reduce risk-taking.

In Switzerland, the Parliament’s upper house (Ständerat) last month voted against a complete ban on variable pay at systemically important banks, like UBS, rejecting a motion adopted by the lower house, the National Council, in 2023.

Ethos’s guidelines set a maximum limit of three times the base salary for CEO remuneration, and twice the base salary for other members of the executive management. 

“These caps are not chosen at random,” said Vincent Kaufmann, CEO of the Ethos Foundation. ”They aim to prevent management from taking excessive or even reckless risks, as was the case during the 2008 financial crisis or the recent collapse of Credit Suisse.” 

In its analysis for clients, Ethos compared, for example, the remuneration of the UBS CEO Sergio Ermotti with those of 15 CEOs of major European financial firms, coming to the conclusion that his base salary is 150% higher than the median, and his total remuneration is 147% higher than the median. 

Ethos also criticised the increase in the cap on variable remuneration for members of Julius Baer’s executive management from four to six times the base salary, particularly after a €606m write-off linked to insolvent Austrian real estate group Signa. 

The foundation is therefore recommending that shareholders of the banks vote against all agenda items relating to remuneration at the AGMs of Julius Baer on 9 April and of UBS on 15 April.