The assets hidden by the second Swiss bank amounted to 2 billion euros, according to the investigations of the national financial prosecutor’s office, which had revealed that 5,000 French customers had an undeclared Swiss Credit account in the Administration fiscal.
Le Monde with AFP
Credit Suisse agreed to pay 238 million euros in France to avoid criminal proceedings for illegal canvassing of customers and aggravated money laundering between 2005 and 2012, according to an agreement validated, Monday, October 24, by the president of Paris court.
By agreeing to sign this public interest judicial agreement concluded with the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF), the second Swiss bank avoids a trial in France and balances its dispute both with the tax administration, to which it will pay 115 million euros in damages, that with the public prosecutor, by paying a fine of 123 million euros. The PNF survey started in 2016 after receipt of reports as part of financial mutual aid for money laundering and illegal banking canvassing. Investigations have revealed that 5,000 French customers have had a Swiss Credit account for many years, not declared to the French tax administration.
The concealed assets amounted to 2 billion euros, recalled the president of the court, Stéphane Noël. “The Credit Suisse did not send any account statements. The canvassing did not comply with French law, the salespeople moved to France, in all discretion. They identified prospects” with “visits to hotels, restaurants, never in Official premises of the French establishment, “he added.
The PNF calculated the fine by taking into account “upper factors”, namely “the systemic nature, a long period, the creation of tools to hide”, detailed the prosecutor François-Xavier Dulin. “The bank has created offshore structures to help its customers in their desire not to declare certain assets to the French administration,” he insisted. The PNF has also taken into account the “small” factors that are “corrective measures taken by the bank, the cooperation of the bank, the compensation of 115,000 million” at the taxman
“a page History “
The bank has twelve months to pay these sums, in three times. “It is a historic page, the vestige of an ancient era that the bank regulates,” said the bank lawyer Charles-Henri Boeringer during the audience. In a press release, Credit Suisse recalled that this judicial convention of public interest did not include recognition of guilt and marked “an important step in the proactive resolution” of litigation.
Exsangue, Credit Suisse has been trying for many months to restore a reputation ravaged by repeated scandals. By bad luck, or more prosaically by excessive risk taking, the bank has committed itself in many sulfurous cases in recent years which have cost it billions: implosion of the archegos and Greensill Capital hedge funds; case of rotten obligations in Mozambique; Bulgarian mafia money laundering punished by the Swiss Supreme Court; Without forgetting the sordid internal espionage affairs between senior leaders at the recent era of the president and chief executive officer Tidjane Thiam. And as if this black novel of bad practices was not enough, a consortium of international newspapers (of which Le Monde) revealed in February in “Switzerland Secrets”, a data leak, how much Credit Switzerland had dipped in many cases questionable.
Before Credit Switzerland, HSBC Private Bank, a Swiss subsidiary of the British banking giant HSBC, had already agreed to pay 300 million euros to escape a trial in France for laundering tax fraud on November 14, 2017. acted with the very first public interest agreement signed in France.