“Tutto bene?” As he walks into the room, I greet Sergio Ermotti with a customary “Is everything okay?” in Italian. The response from the chief executive of UBS is lightning fast. “Almost everything is okay. You can’t say that everything is okay these days.”

A classic Ermotti answer: precise, combative and a little disarming. It is a style that has served him well in his six years at the helm of the Swiss bank. After taking over UBS at the nadir of its powers in 2011, following a massive loss caused by a rogue trader, Ermotti overhauled its business, increased its capital defenses and rebuilt the firm into a wealth management powerhouse.