Bank Writedowns

The Globe and Mail, Eric Reguly, 5 October 2007UBS is a sober Swiss banking giant that has had remarkably few blunders since it was formed 10 years ago from the merger of Union Bank of Switzerland and Credit Suisse. But even it got engulfed in the U.S. subprime mortgage mudslide. On Monday, the bank announced it would write down the value of its fixed-income assets by $3.4-billion (U.S.),