Credit Suisse leak unmasks criminals, fraudsters and corrupt politicians

[Martin Everson]

Oh dear.

----- quote start

• Massive leak reveals secret owners of £80bn held in Swiss bank
• Whistleblower leaked bank’s data to expose ‘immoral’ secrecy laws
• Clients included human trafficker and billionaire who ordered girlfriend’s murder
• Vatican-owned account used to spend €350m in allegedly fraudulent investment

A massive leak from one of the world’s biggest private banks, Credit Suisse, has exposed the hidden wealth of clients involved in torture, drug trafficking, money laundering, corruption and other serious crimes.

Details of accounts linked to 30,000 Credit Suisse clients all over the world are contained in the leak, which unmasks the beneficiaries of more than 100bn Swiss francs (£80bn)* held in one of Switzerland’s best-known financial institutions.

The leak points to widespread failures of due diligence by Credit Suisse, despite repeated pledges over decades to weed out dubious clients and illicit funds. The Guardian is part of a consortium of media outlets given exclusive access to the data.

We can reveal how Credit Suisse repeatedly either opened or maintained bank accounts for a panoramic array of high-risk clients across the world.

------ quote end

Revealed: Credit Suisse leak unmasks criminals, fraudsters and corrupt politicians

Massive leak reveals Swiss bank’s accounts have been used by an array of high-risk clients over several decades

www.theguardian.com

 

[JohnnyDoe]

Money is used (also) to do bad/illegal/immoral things! What a news!
The real meaning of this article is that banks happily partner with criminals big enough to be worth the hassle. They are perfectly useless as a “filter” to block illegal activities, at the contrary they facilitate them.

 

[JohnLocke]

WoW what a breaking news. The entire financial system smells bad.

• Clients included human trafficker and billionaire who ordered girlfriend’s murder
• Vatican-owned account used to spend €350m in allegedly fraudulent investment

what are these people. It shows the picture very clear. The small man on the floor is left with nothing anymore while the one that are stuffed with billions rule the world

 

[Martin Everson]

It gets worse for this bank sadly. A Bulgarian wrestler allegedly laundered drug money in suitcases to deposit at Credit Suisse .

Credit Suisse ignored murders while laundering cocaine cash, banker testifies

Credit Suisse bosses accused during trial of being aware that the bank accepted cash from criminals tied to murders and cocaine smuggling

www.rt.com

 

[sonato]

The leak is probably due to the fact that they have gotten into bad standing by one percent!

 

[daxbr]

Does not look like they have done anything HSBC didn't do. What do CS do to keep pissing off the feds?

AAAh, maybe this is what it is all about: "Swiss legislators are responsible for enabling financial crimes and – by virtue of their direct democracy"

 

[JohnnyDoe]

Nothing that everybody didn’t already know.

 

[gengiskhan]

EU Parliament's top group suggests blacklisting Switzerland after Credit Suisse leaks

The main political grouping in the European Parliament called on Monday for a review of Switzerland's banking practices and for the country's possible inclusion in the EU's dirty-money blacklist after leaks of Credit Suisse documents.

www.reuters.com

Orchestrated behind the scenes?

 

[Golden Fleece]

If you do the historical research, you will see that UBS and Credit Suisse were responsible for wrecking the Swiss bank secrecy laws through their reckless conduct. If the Swiss government was smart, they would have broken up these two banks and forbade any other Swiss banks from using the Western banking model.

If Swiss banks had stuck with the low-profile Swiss banking model, then secrecy would likely still be in place. The U.S. needed high profile, illegal conduct to take down traditional Swiss bank secrecy -- and UBS and Credit Suisse handed it to them on a silver platter. This is simply another idiotic example.

There is a reason that Credit Suisse stock has cratered from nearly $75 to less than $9 per share over the past fifteen years. In fact, I was looking at the stock just last week because it is now so low that it might expose the bank to a hostile takeover. I can only imagine how much further its stock might sink as the result of this fiasco. Only time will tell. It is a filthy organization -- and the polar opposite of traditional Swiss banking operations.

If the Swiss government was smart, it should step in, bust up the bank, and prosecute those responsible. This is from a news article just last week, before this most recent scandal emerged:

Switzerland's second-biggest bank has been plagued by scandal and last week reported a $2.2 billion quarterly loss. It said 2022 earnings would be weighed down by restructuring and compensation costs.

* * *

Addressing speculation that a plunge in the bank's stock price had left Credit Suisse exposed to a takeover, Gottstein said he believed the group was substantially undervalued.

Credit Suisse Aims for Profit in '22, Wants to Go it Alone: CEO

Credit Suisse aims to make a profit this year, Chief Executive Thomas Gottstein told Swiss newspaper Finanz und Wirtschaft in an interview published Friday.

www.newsmax.com

 

[polonieth]

This looks like a targeted takedown...

 

[Martin Everson]

If the Swiss government was smart, they would have broken up these two banks and forbade any other Swiss banks from using the Western banking model.

100% agree. I personally feel with so much scandal Credit Suisse should be broken up and its name consigned to history. It's investment banking assets and clean private banking assets can be sold to plenty of other wiling banks.

The name Credit Suisse is now synonymous with crime. If I could speak to CEO of the bank my first question would be - how does it feel to be the head of a criminal organization?

EU Parliament's top group suggests blacklisting Switzerland after Credit Suisse leaks

The main political grouping in the European Parliament called on Monday for a review of Switzerland's banking practices and for the country's possible inclusion in the EU's dirty-money blacklist after leaks of Credit Suisse documents.

www.reuters.com

Orchestrated behind the scenes?

Ok time to move my assets rather than wait and see .

 

[void]

The name Credit Suisse is now synonymous with crime. If I could speak to CEO of the bank my first question would be - how does it feel to be the head of a criminal organization?

what a tragedy...
every single bank in the world has accounts used by criminals

how does US government or FED feel knowing that US dollar is used around the world by criminals for the worst of the worst purposes?

 

[Golden Fleece]

how does US government or FED feel knowing that US dollar is used around the world by criminals for the worst of the worst purposes?

That is bad logic. You hold the bad actors accountable, not tangible things. If someone commits a crime with a motor vehicle, you punish the criminal. You do not outlaw motor vehicles. If a bank commits a crime using U.S. dollars, you punish the bank (and the other criminals responsible). The crime has nothing to do with the underlying currency.

The Swiss government should have taken action against Credit Suisse long ago. CS has been a bad actor for a long time. And yes, one of the reasons that this company has been an ongoing problem is that it acts too much like banks in other Western nations. The Swiss know how to do banking right. They should have undertaken appropriate self-enforcement actions against CS and UBS to protect their own banking industry. If they had, Swiss banking privacy would likely still exist today (at least in some form). Instead, you have this:

The European People's Party (EPP), the conservative grouping which holds the biggest number of seats in the European Parliament, called on the EU Commission on Monday to "re-evaluate Switzerland as a high-risk money-laundering country" as part of the next review of the list.
* * *

The EU list currently comprises over 20 countries who are deemed to have shortfalls in their rules and practices against money laundering. Among them are Iran, Myanmar, Syria and North Korea. No European country is on the list.

EU Parliament's top group suggests blacklisting Switzerland after Credit Suisse leaks

The main political grouping in the European Parliament called on Monday for a review of Switzerland's banking practices and for the country's possible inclusion in the EU's dirty-money blacklist after leaks of Credit Suisse documents.

www.reuters.com

 

[369]

clearly manipulated to make it more difficult for people trying to secure their money from EU

 

[void]

That is bad logic. You hold the bad actors accountable, not tangible things. If someone commits a crime with a motor vehicle, you punish the criminal. You do not outlaw motor vehicles. If a bank commits a crime using U.S. dollars, you punish the bank (and the other criminals responsible). The crime has nothing to do with the underlying currency.

I was responding to this... nothing else

If I could speak to CEO of the bank my first question would be - how does it feel to be the head of a criminal organization?

baker is not (usually?) feeling bad about selling the bread to a criminal... why should bank (or the CEO) feel bad about the fact that criminals are using their account

 

[JohnnyDoe]

The Swiss know how to do banking right.

Please stop with this fairy tale. The Swiss are no better than anyone else at banking. Swiss banks suck like banks everywhere. After 2008, only psycho monkeys and criminals are left working in banks, including Swiss ones. The entire banking sector is rotten to its roots.

 

[Golden Fleece]

Please stop with this fairy tale. The Swiss are no better than anyone else at banking. Swiss banks suck like banks everywhere. After 2008, only psycho monkeys and criminals are left working in banks, including Swiss ones. The entire banking sector is rotten to its roots.

It is not a fairy tale, but based on over 150 years of history. Yes, the Swiss are not necessarily better than anyone else at banking -- today. But that is a relatively recent development, because UBS and Credit Suisse destroyed the Swiss banking system. Their criminality was the leverage that the U.S. and the EU required to force the Swiss government to finally capitulate to their demands to end bank privacy.

It is one thing to threaten to cut off a small country from the SWIFT system just for operating the way it had over 150 years, by respecting bank clients' privacy. It is quite another matter to threaten to cut off a small country from the SWIFT system because it allowed systemic criminal activity by its two largest banks. This is all historical fact. UBS and Credit Suisse caused the end of traditional, privacy-oriented Swiss banking.

baker is not (usually?) feeling bad about selling the bread to a criminal... why should bank (or the CEO) feel bad about the fact that criminals are using their account

Again, you are using poor logic and a bad analogy. A bank that knowingly allows money laundering is no different than a baker who knowingly allows his business to launder mafia money. Both are legally culpable.

 

[JohnnyDoe]

It is not a fairy tale, but based on over 150 years of history. Yes, the Swiss are not necessarily better than anyone else at banking -- today. But that is a relatively recent development, because UBS and Credit Suisse destroyed the Swiss banking system. Their criminality was the leverage that the U.S. and the EU required to force the Swiss government to finally capitulate to their demands to end bank privacy.

It is one thing to threaten to cut off a small country from the SWIFT system just for operating the way it had over 150 years, by respecting bank clients' privacy. It is quite another matter to threaten to cut off a small country from the SWIFT system because it allowed systemic criminal activity by its two largest banks. This is all historical fact. UBS and Credit Suisse caused the end of traditional, privacy-oriented Swiss banking.

The “tradition” started only in the 1930s, for a series of political reasons. Jews as well as Nazis benefited from it.
We are in 2022 and the banking system is a thing of the past, like horse carriages were in 1910 compared to cars.

 

[Golden Fleece]

The “tradition” started only in the 1930s, for a series of political reasons. Jews as well as Nazis benefited from it.

As a matter of well-established history, you are wrong. Swiss banking privacy existed long before Article 47 of the Banking Law of 1934:

What the country did offer was a pronounced relationship of trust that had been built up between banks and clients over the course of the century, and that had become established as an unwritten code of confidentiality similar to the one offered by lawyers, doctors or priests. De facto banking secrecy had therefore existed for a long time; but it was not enshrined in legislation until relatively late on. Prior to the 1930s an avowedly liberal economic and political environment, and an equally pronounced understanding of the importance of privacy and discretion had made such legislation superfluous.

https://www.finanzgeschichte.ch/Vogler%20Swiss%20Banking%20Secrecy.pdf

 

[JohnnyDoe]

If you have to rely on “banking secrecy” for hiding your affairs you will sooner or later get into troubles. As it happened plenty of times even when the “banking secrecy” in Switzerland was still a thing.