After months of speculation, UBS AG is staying put in Stamford but with fewer employees.
The company said it would maintain a minimum workforce of 2,000 people in the city, after accepting $20 million in state incentives.
The announcement came Aug. 23, the same day the Switzerland-based financial giant said it would cut 3,500 jobs globally, without specifying where.
In a press conference Tuesday at UBS”™ main office in Stamford Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said he had been apprehensive that the city could lose the bank”™s entire operation.
Malloy was mayor of Stamford in 1997 when UBS established an Americas headquarters operation and massive trading floor, accepting well over $100 million in incentives to do so.
At the height of the last business cycle, UBS reported having more than 4,500 workers in Stamford and small wealth management offices in Fairfield County. Philip Lofts, CEO of UBS Group Americas, said the company currently has 3,500 workers in Connecticut.
Lofts acknowledged that UBS had considered New York and New Jersey as a destination for workers currently in Stamford but would not say how many have moved to date.
Mayor Michael Pavia said he believed UBS has between 2,600 and 2,800 at its Stamford facility.
Both Malloy and Lofts stressed that the Stamford workforce could expand to significantly more than 2,000 workers as the economy recovers.
