The premise of a discussion of Ticino's current financial center cannot fail to address the various external factors that have led to its many changes and the significant consequences they have brought about over the past few decades. It was certainly not a strategic choice, in short, but rather the imperative need to adapt to a constantly evolving international context that prompted the progressive adaptation of a mechanism that had been refined over time—reaching peaks of growth and profitability of absolute excellence—to the point of becoming a true benchmark for the Canton's entire economic apparatus.
While maintaining an unquestionable solidity and a solid relevance among the main activities conducted in the country, the banking sector is today significantly reduced compared to its golden age at the end of the last century. The snapshot illustrating the current situation Franco Citterio, from his privileged observatory as Director of theTicino Banking Association, however, wanted to underline with some data the continued competitiveness of the Lugano area in particular: despite the decreased number of active institutions in the city, currently 40, and the contraction in tax revenue, the sector as a whole maintains a high value on the labor market with approximately 20.000 employees in quality jobs.
While the greatest challenges our financial sector has faced and overcome are primarily attributable to the various external tides that have struck it—international crises with global repercussions, the pressures that led to the collapse of banking secrecy, the new fiscal approach promoted by Italian authorities, the bankruptcy of Credit Suisse, and the merger of Switzerland's second-largest bank into UBS—it would be wrong to ignore some internal challenges that have also contributed to weakening its image, at the very least, during an already delicate historical period.
From this perspective, the relationship between Ticino and the banking world has not been without its grey areas. Indeed, there have been some truly dark moments, which the lawyer and professor Mauro Mini, a former magistrate active precisely during the period in which the justice system had to deal with cases of a worryingly diverse nature and scope: from smuggling to embezzlement, up to mafia-style practices and money laundering, in a sort of evident chronological parallel between the typology of these cases and the various nuances proposed by the criminal panorama on a much broader international scale.
It would be wrong to deny that in those years our region benefited from undoubtedly favorable contingencies - based on the regulatory plan in force and amplified in their impact by the geographical one - to access almost unlimited sources of income, which for other realities would have been simply impossible to imagine: the awareness of the historical legacy of an era that may seem much more distant than it actually is has not, however, prevented Karin Valenciano Rossi, Lugano City Councilor, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Raiffaisen Bank Lugano, and a member of the Board of Directors of Raiffaisen Bank Switzerland, emphasizes that this model no longer exists today, nor can it be replicated. For the Lugano-based lawyer, the rules of the game have definitively and irreversibly changed, as have the general conditions and skills required of operators within a transformation process that is not without pitfalls, starting with excessive procedures and inevitable bureaucracy, which generate additional costs for savers and entrepreneurs. For all clients, that is, including those of a cooperative institution originally dedicated to supporting rural communities, which has successfully expanded across all segments and found a systemic place in the modern Swiss financial landscape.
Critical issues and risks are no longer a thing of the past, however: there has been a reduction, it's true, thanks to the increasingly sophisticated control protocols introduced in Switzerland and abroad, but even this cannot be considered the ideal solution capable of satisfying everyone's needs.
Why banks are not all the same and why especially for the smaller ones according to Marco TiniCEO Axion Swiss Bank there is a real danger of identity and therefore of role: their way of doing and being a bank is already changing, due to a loss of attractiveness of the classic roles of collaborators - who have become criminally responsible subjects even in cases of negligence - and of ever greater forced investments of human resources in legal, risk management and compliance and confidentiality.
In short, our financial centre must not stop trying to reinvent itself: Alex OberholzerCEO Credinvest, new markets will need to be explored as alternatives to the Italian one to best exploit this extremely diverse range of players in the region, which could constitute – together with the quality of individual professionalism – one of the distinctive characteristics in maintaining its potential, which is still of absolute value. If the sector is no longer comparable in structure and compactness to that of the past, it will instead need to focus on a new dynamism and greater agility in ensuring a truly modern service.
These reflections could not fail to be intertwined with the current complex integration of Credit Suisse into UBS, which led to the creation of a Swiss banking system very different from the previous one. Luca PedrottiCEO UBS Ticino, believes that this difficult and costly operation, which is currently being successfully completed, was fundamental for the Swiss financial center, which must be able to count on the driving force of a leading global institution.
Despite opposition to the Federal Council's excessive demands on equity capital reserves, UBS is ready to fully assume its role in technological development and training.
«The near future – according to Pedrotti – will see us committed to continuously innovating our financial services and products, also leveraging the importance of new technologies. An advanced platform also capable of providing services to other institutions in the local network.
This is undoubtedly a very interesting and generally shared vision, despite some understandable differences in perspective that emerged during the discussion. It clearly and enthusiastically projects the Ticino financial center into an era of predictable, great turmoil, in which the experience of the successes and vicissitudes that have shaped the history of our banking system will be indispensable for overcoming the far from simple challenges that await it.
For all the images from the roundtable discussion on the Ticino financial center:
© Visiva Sagl
