With this in mind, a further strengthening of the capital situation and – in conjunction with this – a further realignment of the business model in order to achieve sustainable profitability, are still central challenges facing the big banks. The profitability and the capital situation of the banks with a domestic business focus – the cantonal, regional and Raiffeisen banks – were significantly higher in 2009 than the longterm average. The dip in GDP from mid-2008 to mid-2009 has so far barely had any effect on these banks, with the result that the provisioning requirement for credit risk continued at a low level in 2009. Nevertheless, in our estimation, the position of these bank categories is less comfortable than may appear at first glance. First of all, the capital situation of the Raiffeisen banks and the state-guaranteed cantonal banks needs to be put into perspective: the Raiffeisen banks can count the additional funding obligation required of members in the  BIS Review 85/2010  1  cooperative as capital until the end of 2011, and the cantonal banks are entitled to a reduction in required capital due to the state guarantee. In the absence of these concessions, the capital ratios – particularly for the Raiffeisen banks – would be markedly lower. Second, according to our assessment, the risk exposure of the domestically focused banks is higher now than it was in 2009. For one thing, the interest rate risk of cantonal and Raiffeisen banks is at historically high levels.
Large-scale support measures deployed by governments and central banks played an essential role in ensuring that the global economy, the financial markets and thus also the banks recovered sooner and more vigorously than had been anticipated a year ago. For the banking sector alone, the major industrial nations committed funds amounting to almost 20% of gross domestic product. As a result of the different measures to support the economy and the banking sector, there has been a considerable rise in the indebtedness of many countries, and also, in some countries, in sovereign credit risk. The international big banks – including the Swiss big banks – benefited substantially from these support measures, and were able to increase their profitability in 2009. At the same time, the Swiss big banks reduced their balance sheets by approximately a quarter. Compared to the previous year, their capital situation improved substantially. Their riskweighted capital ratios, in particular, have increased markedly, and are high also by international standards. This is a very positive development. However, it should not be allowed to conceal the fact that the leverage of both big banks is still high – both per se and when compared with banks in other countries. The big banks are still a long way from meeting the leverage target that will apply in Switzerland from 2013.