Swiss National Bank says 90% CET1 backing for UBS a good outcome

BERN, Sept 24 (Reuters) - A 90% Common Equity Tier 1 backing for UBS's foreign units is a "good amount", SNB Vice Chairman Antoine Martin said on Thursday, a day after Switzerland's upper house of parliament voted on new banking regulations.

Switzerland is drawing up new banking rules to avoid another crisis following the 2023 collapse of Credit Suisse and its subsequent takeover by UBS.

More backing of foreign participations with CET1 capital is better from a financial stability perspective, Martin said, reiterating the central bank's previous position.

"In that respect, 90% is a good amount of CET1 capital to back these foreign participations," he said. "Of course, 100% would have been even better from the perspective of financial stability."

Martin said that it's not the central bank's role to comment on the actions of parliament, but that the SNB has a legal mandate to contribute to financial stability.

"At the moment, it's still extremely important to draw the right conclusions from the Credit Suisse crisis," SNB Chairman Martin Schlegel said, adding the SNB has full faith in the government and in parliament to reach decisions in the interest of Switzerland.

"The proposed measures are actually important, and they really address some regulatory weaknesses that we identified in the Credit Suisse crisis," Schlegel said.

(Reporting by Ariane Luthi, editing by John Revill)