Credit Suisse profits lower than expected

The results fell far short of the forecasts of analysts polled by the AWP financial news agency who had anticipated the bank would post a net profit of 803 million francs for the latest quarter.

Net earnings for the first nine months of the year totalled 2.8 billion francs, up from 1.1 billion francs in the same period in 2012.

Switzerland’s second largest bank benefited from cutting costs and “effective capital management” to offset “the impact of challenging market conditions, characterized by low levels of client activity across many of our businesses,” CEO Brady Dougan said in a statement.

"Over the past two years we have taken significant steps to evolve our business model in response to the changing market and regulatory environment,” Dougan said.

The bank said it had achieved annualized cost savings of three billion francs in the first nine months of the year and was on track to cutting 4.5 billion francs a year by 2015.