Maureen Miskovic is leaving UBS, where she has spent less than one year as group chief risk officer.
She leaves in the wake of the $2.3 billion unauthorised losses caused by Kweku Adoboli that the risk department failed to catch — losses that also prompted the departure of UBS chairman Oswald Gruebel.
She is replaced by her predecessor, Philip Lofts, who left the risk job to become CEO of UBS in America. He will now be replaced in the US by Robert McCann, who will retain his US wealth management responsibilities.
Miskovic once headed risk management for ill-fated Lehman Brothers, before leaving that firm abruptly in 2003. She then worked at Eurasia Group, a firm started by her partner at the time and economics wunderkind Ian Bremmer, before becoming chief risk officer at State Street in 2008.
She joined UBS in early 2010. Enquiring whether she left voluntarily or not, a spokesman for the firm says he understands her departure is not related to the aforementioned unauthorised losses and she is ‘leaving to pursue other opportunities outside the bank etc’.
Another commentator voiced it less diplomatically.
“How anyone could hire the architect of Lehman Brothers’ risk management — a firm not known for its internal control environment, and indeed one that was repeatedly almost bust long before its final ignominious implosion — is beyond me,” said one highly placed banking industry veteran.
