More than 120 senior bankers at Credit Suisse have reportedly departed the company since it was taken over by rival UBS earlier this year.

Sources told the Financial Times that in recent months Deutsche Bank has hired up to 40 former Credit Suisse bankers globally, while Jefferies has brought on at least 25 and Santander more than 20.

The departure rate from Credit Suisse investment bank has been higher than UBS planned before beginning work on folding the failed bank into its operations, the sources also told the news outlet, claiming this is due to rivals in the sector having made “opportunistic moves” to poach senior bankers and their teams.

Switzerland’s central bank brokered a “rescue deal” for UBS to acquire Credit Suisse in a deal worth around $3 billion which commenced in March and completed on 12 June. The lender’s woes began after its shares plummeted by 20 per cent in the wake of Silicon Valley Bank’s (SVB) collapse, which spooked investors throughout the financial ecosystem.

Credit Suisse chairman Axel Lehman later said he was “truly sorry” for the lender’s collapse and that he believed the situation could be turned around "until the beginning of the fateful week" and apologised that the bank was “no longer able to stem the loss of trust."

At a final shareholder meeting, Lehman said: "Until the end, we fought hard to find a solution. But ultimately, there were only two options: deal or bankruptcy. The merger had to go through."

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