Navigation

Navigation

About Us

Group Priorities

Building on the momentum we have established, we aim to further grow our client business with gains in market share and a strengthened geographic footprint.

We expect our client-focused, capital-efficient strategy to benefit from a more constructive market environment while limiting our risk exposure in down markets. We believe that our strategy is consistent with both emerging client needs and regulatory trends. We have increased clarity on our future regulatory environment, and we are well advanced on implementation. We feel well positioned to succeed in the changing operating environment and target an annual after-tax return on equity of greater than 15% over the next three to five years. To achieve our goals, we are focused on the following priorities.

Client Focus

We put our clients' needs first. We aspire to be a consistent, reliable, flexible and long-term partner focused on clients with complex and multi-product needs, such as ultra-high-networth individuals, large and mid-sized companies, entrepreneurs, institutional clients and hedge funds. By listening attentively to their needs and offering them superior solutions, we empower them to make better financial decisions. Against the backdrop of significant changes within our industry, we strive to ensure that we consistently help our clients realize their goals and thrive. We continue to strengthen the coverage of our key clients by dedicated teams of senior executives who can deliver our integrated business model. On the back of a strong capital position and high levels of client satisfaction and brand recognition, we achieved significant gains in market share. Our strong client momentum is well recognized. We were awarded "Best Global Bank 2010", "Best Bank in Switzerland 2010", "Best Private Bank Globally" for 2011 for the second consecutive year and "Best Emerging Markets Investment Bank 2010" by Euromoney and "Best Bank in Switzerland" and "Most Innovative Investment Bank 2010" by The Banker. In addition, we maintained our strong brand recognition and continued to feature among the Top 3 "Most Admired Megabanks" in Fortune magazine's annual rankings.

Employees

We continue to undertake efforts to attract, develop and retain top talent in order to deliver an outstanding integrated value proposition to our clients. Our candidates go through a rigorous interview process, where we not only look for technical and intellectual proficiency, but for people who can thrive in and contribute to our culture. Credit Suisse is above the external benchmark for employee engagement in the financial services industry. We review our talent and identify the right developmental opportunities based on individual and organizational needs. We increasingly promote cross-divisional and crossregional development, as well as lateral recruiting and mobility. Valuing different perspectives, creating an inclusive environment and showing cross-cultural sensitivity are key to Credit Suisse's workplace culture. We have expanded our organizational understanding beyond traditional diversity and inclusion to leverage our differences to fully engage the workforce. Through our business school, we train our leaders, specialists and client advisors in a wide range of subjects to ensure that the knowledge and competence of our employees supports the needs of our clients and our strategy. We take a prudent and constructive approach to compensation, designed to reflect the performance of individuals and the firm and closely align the interests of employees with those of shareholders.

Collaboration

We help our clients thrive by delivering the best of our products and services across our organization and divisions. We have established a dedicated governance structure in order to drive, measure and manage collaboration between our divisions. In 2010, we recorded collaboration revenues of CHF 4.4 billion. Going forward we will target collaboration revenues of 18% to 20% of net revenues. Since the inception of our collaboration program in 2006, we have built a strong track record of delivering customized value propositions. We believe this is a significant differentiator for Credit Suisse. We have observed increasing momentum in collaboration initiatives, including tailored solutions for wealthy private clients by Investment Banking, a new suite of managed investment products developed by Asset Management for Private Banking, and strengthened client management coordination by our alternative investments distribution team in Asset Management with the securities distribution team in Investment Banking. Benefitting from our programs for cross-divisional management development and lateral recruiting, we believe collaboration revenues, including cross-selling and client referrals, to be a resilient source of both revenues and assets.

Capital and Risk Management

While the prudent taking of risk in line with our strategic priorities is fundamental to our business as a leading global bank, we maintain a conservative framework to manage liquidity and capital. As of the end of 2010, our tier 1 ratio under qBasel II stood at 17.2%, up from 16.3% the year before. Consistent with the Swiss Expert Commission's recommendations, we took action to raise tier 1 and tier 2 contingent buffer capital in February 2011. We have revised our liquidity risk management, which is in line with the BCBS Basel III liquidity framework and the liquidity principles of FINMA. We continue to deploy capital in a disciplined manner based on our economic capital model, assessing our aggregated risk taking in relation to our client needs and our financial resources. For further information refer to III - Treasury, Risk, Balance sheet and Off-balance sheet - Treasury management - Capital management.

Efficiency

We continue to strive for top-quartile efficiency levels, while being careful not to compromise on growth or reputation. For our core activities we targeted a cost/income ratio of 65%. Going forward, we will target a pre-tax income margin above 28%. Efficiency measures implemented with strong involvement of senior management have generated cost savings while helping to build an efficiency culture. We have five Centers of Excellence (CoE) in Pune, Raleigh Durham, Singapore, Wroclaw and Mumbai in which we have deployed more than 10,000 roles, improving productivity. We continue to focus on our Operational Excellence program, which has strengthened our culture of continuous improvement and client focus.

To track our progress and benchmark our performance, we have defined a set of key performance indicators for growth, efficiency and performance, and capital to be achieved across market cycles. For a more detailed description of our businesses and our performance in 2010 against the defined targets, refer to II - Operating and financial review - Key performance indicators.

Corporate Responsibility and Code of Conduct

At Credit Suisse, we firmly believe that corporate responsibility plays a crucial role in our long-term success as a business. We therefore strive to incorporate our approach to corporate responsibility into every aspect of our work. This approach is founded on a broad understanding of our commitments in banking, society and the environment, our role as an employer and our dialogue with our stakeholders.

During 2010 we reviewed our ethical values and professional standards against the backdrop of regulatory trends. As a result, we amended our Code of Conduct to ensure that all employees operate within a commonly shared framework. Additionally, we reviewed, simplified and formalized our approach to compensation, which is reflected in our Compensation Policy.

To ensure that we supply the full breadth of information required by our stakeholders, we publish a Corporate Responsibility Report and additional information, which can be found at www.credit-suisse.com/responsibility.

Secondary Content