Status: 10/20/2021 10:33 a.m.
The Swiss financial supervisory authority has confirmed that the major bank Credit Suisse had serious deficiencies in the shadowing affair. In a second affair over loans for Mozambique, the bank in the US has to pay a fine of $ 475 million.
The Swiss financial supervisory authority (Finma) found serious deficiencies in two cases at the major bank Credit Suisse. On the one hand, there is the so-called “shadowing affair”: Between 2016 and 2019, Credit Suisse had several people monitored by detectives, including its former top manager Iqbal Khan. The former head of personnel was also observed, and, as the Swiss financial supervisory authority now reports, other employees and “third parties abroad”.
Destructive judgment of the financial regulator
The judgment of the supervisory authority is devastating: Credit Suisse had “no adequate organization within the meaning of the Swiss Banking Act” and “also offered no guarantee of proper business activity in the relevant period”. Proper and documented decision-making processes were not even rudimentarily established.
Finma will now conduct enforcement proceedings against three individuals in order to clarify their individual responsibility in the shadowing affair. The authority may not impose fines. In the meantime, the bank has regulated the decision-making and monitoring processes more clearly, according to the report by the Swiss financial supervisory authority, which now obliges Credit Suisse to set up a new internal reporting system.
$ 475 million fine in Mozambique affair
In a second procedure, Finma had investigated a scandal involving loans to Mozambique. Here the financial supervisory authority comes to the conclusion that Credit Suisse has seriously violated its money laundering reporting obligations. The risk management showed “serious deficiencies”. American and British authorities also investigated the Mozambique affair.
On Tuesday evening, the US securities regulator SEC announced in Washington that Credit Suisse had accepted a settlement in the Mozambique affair and was ready to pay $ 475 million. In addition to the fines, the Swiss bank must cancel Mozambique’s debts of $ 200 million.
Credit Suisse in the Mozambique affair
Credit Suisse was among the banks that arranged $ 2 billion in loan financing between 2013 and 2016 to expand Mozambique’s coastguard, shipping fleet and tuna industries. However, according to the US authorities, hundreds of millions of dollars disappeared in the course of a sophisticated system of bribes and kickbacks. Government officials and bankers have enriched themselves, the indictment said. Three Credit Suisse bankers involved in brokering the loans have pleaded guilty to the conspiracy to violate anti-corruption laws in the United States, among other things.
Swiss financial supervision: Serious deficiencies at Credit Suisse
Kathrin Hondl, ARD Geneva, October 20, 2021 8:38 am