You must have come from a really bad firm.

My friend, you haven’t been here(UBS) long enough.    Marten Hoekstra is the emperor without any clothes.   His minions don’t tell him what’s going on…their only concern is keeping their own jobs.

As a somewhat recent recruit from Merrill, I can tell you that from our point of view, Marten has positioned this firm very well to be a real leader in the HNW and UHNW space. It seems that the vast majority of the issues were not caused by Marten and he has done his best to navigate the various storms that have hit the industry and the firm. The resources to win in these niches are much stronger at UBS than at Merrill in many ways. The firm is tightly focused on these target markets rather than trying to be everywhere and constantly worried about touting having the larges force of FAs.  The entrepreneurial nature of the organization (at least compared to Merrill) really enables one to be creative and get things done. The advisors, at least in my office, are uniformly intelligent, do the business the right way and are having great success. Marten also appears on his conference calls to be a very straight shooter who pretty much tells it like it is and accepts responsibility where warranted. We were very happy at Merrill and truly thought it was the best place to be until the B of A acquisition, which led us to look at other options so we are by no means anti-Merrill. We diligently researched all the options including MS, SB, JPM, CS, DB and going independent and came here because we believed this firm was truly going in the right direction. We haven ot been disappointed and were surprised how much better we believe we are positioned to tackle these market niches now than before. We only hope that the firm continues in this direction and strongly believe that Marten should continue to run UBS.

[quote=BeenThere]My friend, you haven’t been here(UBS) long enough.    Marten Hoekstra is the emperor without any clothes.   His minions don’t tell him what’s going on…their only concern is keeping their own jobs.

I don’t think anyone can repair the reputation of the UBS disaster. This week reports came out that IRS agents were tailing UBS FAs in effort to pressure UBS. UBS already hit the Iceberg. Grab a life vest and push the steering class out of your way on the way to the life raft. I jumped ship UBS at the end of 07. Marten ignored the ice berg. He doesn’t have it in him to fix the ship. The damage is done

WOW!!! this guy not only drank the kool-aid but is drowning in it , thinking Marty will lead UBS-America out of this mess.  Good luck ex-ML guy, keep trying to justify your move!!! 

[quote=georgicaclose] [quote=BeenThere]My friend, you haven’t been here(UBS) long enough.    Marten Hoekstra is the emperor without any clothes.   His minions don’t tell him what’s going on…their only concern is keeping their own jobs.

As a somewhat recent recruit from Merrill, I can tell you that from our point of view, Marten has positioned this firm very well to be a real leader in the HNW and UHNW space. It seems that the vast majority of the issues were not caused by Marten and he has done his best to navigate the various storms that have hit the industry and the firm. The resources to win in these niches are much stronger at UBS than at Merrill in many ways. The firm is tightly focused on these target markets rather than trying to be everywhere and constantly worried about touting having the larges force of FAs.  The entrepreneurial nature of the organization (at least compared to Merrill) really enables one to be creative and get things done. The advisors, at least in my office, are uniformly intelligent, do the business the right way and are having great success. Marten also appears on his conference calls to be a very straight shooter who pretty much tells it like it is and accepts responsibility where warranted. We were very happy at Merrill and truly thought it was the best place to be until the B of A acquisition, which led us to look at other options so we are by no means anti-Merrill. We diligently researched all the options including MS, SB, JPM, CS, DB and going independent and came here because we believed this firm was truly going in the right direction. We haven ot been disappointed and were surprised how much better we believe we are positioned to tackle these market niches now than before. We only hope that the firm continues in this direction and strongly believe that Marten should continue to run UBS.

The only thing that can fix ubs (PW) is new leadership in wealth management.

I have always liked Marten and feel that the majority of the
issues at UBS are with the upper-middle management as noted by someone in this
thread before. They manage up very well, say the right things, put together
nice charts and graphs but don’t seem to understand what happens outside of <st1:city w:st=“on”><st1:place w:st=“on”>Weehawken</st1:place></st1:city> or how the
business is done. Most of these people have risen up by being good yes
men/women or by filling certain HR hiring needs but they have either never been
in the business, other than corporate, or it has been so long since they
stepped out of the ivory tower that they just don’t get it. With that as a background,
how can this ultimately not be a problem for Marten? He may talk a good game
and be very approachable and empathetic but if he relies on inept lieutenants
and does not replace them then ultimately where does the buck stop? For the
sake of the firm there needs to be a top down cleansing as opposed to them
continuing to save their own a**es while eliminating field personnel and middle
managers. Those cuts are largely the wrong ones in my opinion.

WELL SAID!!!

hoskstra and price