In his latest interview with the British newspaper “Financial Times”, Ermotti pointed out: the growing productivity divergence and lack of economic growth on the continent.
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He pointed to excessive regulation as the main reason for this state of affairs, which, in his opinion, stifles innovation and development.
Bureaucracy over innovation. The head of a large bank referred to Greece
The head of the Swiss bank emphasized that the problem does not concern only the financial sector, but the entire economic system. “If overregulation only applied to banking, we could probably live with it. However, we have excessive regulation across the board” said Ermotti.
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According to him, the current situation is bad, but still “not bad enough” to force the political class to carry out the necessary reforms.
Ermotti also believes that Only a shock on the scale of the 2012 Greek debt crisis could prompt governments to take real action. Until then, politicians will avoid asking citizens to make sacrifices, promising instead to solve the problems with higher taxes, new debt and fiscal stimulus.
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Threats to the economy on the horizon
Ermotti also warned against the “high degree of complacency in financial markets”, which he observed even before the outbreak of the conflict in the Middle East in February 2026. He also drew attention to the area private debt, in which problems may be of a systemic nature, although – as he noted – they are not comparable to the financial crisis of 2008.
As the British newspaper emphasizes, his intervention is part of the pessimistic assessment of the European economy, shared by other financial leaders, such as Jamie Dimon from JPMorgan Chase, who has already indicated that Europe is losing the race with China and the USA.
