UBS Shares Sink Anew on Writedown Fears

By Thomas Atkins

ZURICH (Reuters) - Swiss bank UBS AG (UBSN.VX) came under renewed pressure on Thursday due to speculation it had begun selling off risky mortgages at a deep discount and that its subprime losses were rapidly mounting.

Investors fretted that UBS may face huge losses if it offloaded stressed investments at fire-sale prices, and at the same time, worried about the uncertainty of future losses if it didn't.

Bond manager Pimco (ALVG.DE) rejected reports it had bought UBS' entire 26.6 billion Swiss franc ($25.7 billion) portfolio of Alt-A investments, U.S. mortgages ranked between prime and subprime, according to a CNBC report citing an unnamed executive.

But investors still took the news to mean that UBS, the world's largest wealth manager and the European bank hardest hit by the subprime crisis, was grappling with its massive portfolio of risky assets, valued at around $90 billion.

"UBS is slowly getting a handle on its risk and it seems to be working hard to bring that down and return to its strengths, which is more old fashioned investment banking and wealth management. But this going to take time," said analyst Tom Jenkins at bank RBS.

Analysts also see the ailing bank making further writedowns on a 400 billion franc portfolio of repurchase agreements as it rushes to cut its exposure to the capital markets in general and to risky assets in particular.

While reducing the Alt-A assets would free UBS of some uncertainty that has dogged its share price, the cost could be heavy, entailing additional losses. By contrast, any writedown on its repo portfolio may raise fears of more losses to come.

"Managing down a 2.3 trillion Swiss franc mortgage-heavy balance sheet in a turning credit cycle will be costly and risky and could overhang the earnings power of business," Morgan Stanley said in a note to clients.  Continued...