Swiss banking giant UBS is to cut 500 jobs from its worldwide operation.

As part of a cost cutting drive, around 180 jobs will be lost in Switzerland, 90 in the USA and the remainder from the UK and Asia-Pacific. The total represents marginally less than 6% of UBS' 8,700-strong total IT workforce.

A spokesperson for the bank stated that some of the job cuts relate to its arrangement with Indian IT offshore outsourcing provider Cognizant.

40 employees are said to have opted for early retirement, and some positions may be relocated, but redundancies will definitely take place.