LONDON (Reuters Breakingviews) - Thomas Gottstein’s plan for Credit Suisse is all about growth. The centerpiece of the bank’s strategy under its new chief executive is to turbocharge pre-tax profit in wealth management. Yet results released on Thursday shone a light on one business he ought to consider shrinking: fixed-income trading. Both Credit Suisse and its Zurich rival UBS are wealth managers with investment banks tacked onto the side. The perennial question is how big these wholesale divisions need to be to support the main business of managing money for billionaires and millionaires. UBS slashed fixed-income trading to focus on equities after the financial crisis. Gottstein’s predecessor Tidjane Thiam largely quit the businesses of making markets in government bonds and interest-rate derivatives, known as rates trading. That decision hurt Credit Suisse in 2020. Gottstein’s fixed-income traders hauled in 26% more revenue than in 2019. But the wider market was up 41%, based on a Breakingviews analysis of investment bank results. Much of that came from rates trading, as central banks loosened policy. Credit Suisse’s specialisms, like structured credit and leveraged finance, had a slower year. Its debt underwriting business also lost market share, Dealogic data shows. Gottstein will hope for a better relative showing in 2021 as central bank policy calms down. But that won’t change the strategic quandary facing Credit Suisse’s investment bank: the areas where it’s strongest, like structured credit and leveraged finance, are those that traditionally have the least relevance to wealth management. UBS’s focus on equities trading, by contrast, coheres more closely to the typical requirements of its super-rich clients. That dynamic could arguably be changing, as low interest rates push the wealthy to shift more assets into higher-yielding investments like structured credit and private debt. Even so, the sheer size of Gottstein’s fixed-income business is conspicuous. It is 1.6 times bigger than equities, based on 2019 and 2020 revenue. At UBS, currency and debt-trading together bring in half as much as trading stocks. Righting the balance would be painful. Fixed income is almost certainly more profitable for the bank than equities. Shifting capital away from debt trading would therefore hit short-term returns. But the prize would be greater strategic clarity and, potentially, a higher valuation. Credit Suisse currently trades at a 25% discount to UBS, based on expected tangible book values for 2021. For Gottstein, another trading shakeup is worth considering.