By Tom Miles and Katharina Bart ZURICH, Dec 19 (Reuters) - Unlike the outrage that hitBarclays after the British bank was fined for rigging abenchmark interest rate, reaction in Switzerland to UBS's 1.4 billion franc ($1.53 billion) penalty for the sameoffence has been muted. There appears to be little appetite to attack UBS, whosereputation has already been tarnished by a series of damagingmistakes. The Swiss government and Swiss National Bank both said theyhad taken note of the penalty, but didn't comment further onWednesday. Even Christian Levrat, president of the left-wing SocialDemocrats (SP) which is typically critical of banks, stoppedshort of calling for any specific changes at the bank. He said he wanted UBS to be more transparent and cooperativein unearthing past scandals. "This game of cat-and-mouse muststop," he told Reuters. The seeming nonchalance over UBS is a sharp contrast withthe crisis that engulfed Barclays, which got a muchsmaller fine of $450 million in June. Barclays had hoped that it would get some credit by goingfirst in what is expected to be a series of banks making settlements related to manipulating the Libor rate. Instead, thefine triggered a storm of angry newspaper headlines and outragein parliament and among the British public. Barclays' chief executive Bob Diamond was forced out of hisjob less than a week later and Chairman Marcus Agius has alsobeen replaced. Lawmakers grilled top officials at the Bank of England andFinancial Services Authority and accused them of failing torespond properly to U.S. concerns about possible Libor rigging. The contrasting fates of the two banks may suggest a "waitand see" policy makes more sense, according to insiders atDeutsche Bank, which is facing months ofinvestigation for its part in the global Libor scandal. "The one who moved first here has lost," said a source atDeutsche Bank, which was not involved in settlementnegotiations. Paul Dembinski, a Swiss university professor who heads theObservatoire de la Finance, a think tank that studies the ethicsof finance, said UBS had seen the risk and managed it well. "This settlement is a way of not opening all the books andnot showing everything. It's a way of managing risks," he said."From a bank perspective it's a very reasonable amount." About 40 employees have left UBS over the scandal, afraction of the 10,000 job losses planned as the bank withdrawsfrom fixed-income business. "People were in the process of adjusting to the 10,000 cutsand starting to get more comfortable looking ahead to where wewant to be in 2015, so this (fine) is a distraction," a seniorUBS employee told Reuters. "That notwithstanding, there is a general feeling we'redoing the right things and moving in the right direction," theemployee added. Despite the size of UBS's fine, it remains unclear if thescandal will cost UBS more than the money it made from Libormanipulation. In a memo to staff, Chief Executive Sergio Ermotti said thebank was unable to assess the impact on its clients. "The regulatory investigations continue, and we are far fromhaving an understanding of the effect of the actions of multipleinstitutions on the actual rate fixings, which one would need toknow before trying to determine whether or how clients wereaffected," he said. UBS did not mention the damage to savers and borrowers inits public statement.