UBS seeing positive client flows this quarter – Khan

ZURICH (Reuters) -UBS Group is seeing positive flows of client funds this quarter, the co-head of the Swiss bank’s wealth management business said on Tuesday.

The first quarter had been pretty strong and it viewed the slowdown in the second quarter as an “anomaly”, Iqbal Khan told the BofA Global Research financials conference.

“As of this quarter we are seeing positive flows,” he said without being specific. He said the bank’s performance made him confident about its ambition to boost net new fee-earning assets by 5%.

UBS, the world’s largest wealth manager, will focus on organic growth in the U.S. market after calling off a planned $1.4 billion acquisition of Wealthfront, Khan said.

Khan said UBS strategy was about gaining scale and raising profitability in the U.S. market, capturing growth in Asia, gaining profitability in the EMEA region, and working on market share and cost discipline in Switzerland.

Khan, who joined Switzerland’s biggest bank in 2019 to co-head its flagship division, will become sole head of the business when co-president Tom Naratil steps down next month after decades with the bank.

(Reporting by Michael Shields, editing by Rachel More and Louise Heavens)