Tag Archives: Law and order

For journalists and historian, Swiss banking data remains behind locked doors. © Keystone / Gaetan Bally Swiss banking secrecy used to be the bane of foreign countries trying to catch tax cheats. Now it’s the turn of Swiss journalists and historians to cry foul of laws that can hinder their work. When not covering fintech, cryptocurrencies, blockchain, banks and trade, swissinfo.ch’s business correspondent can be found playing cricket on various grounds in...

[caption id="attachment_994215" align="alignleft" width="400"] The Swiss commodities trader is taking legal action. Keystone / Martial Trezzini[/caption] Swiss commodities trading company Trafigura says it has been defrauded to the tune of $577 million (CHF530 million) by fake nickel shipments. The firm has launched legal action against a Dubai-based metals trader and the group of companies he runs out of the Middle East emirate. “The fraud...

Schwarzenbach (left) leaving a court building back in 2017. © Keystone / Walter Bieri A court in Zurich has rejected an appeal by the renowned Swiss art collector and financier Urs Schwarzenbach in two cases of tax evasion in connection with the import of works of art. The court also decided to increase from CHF8.5 million ($8.5 million) to 9.6 million the fines compared with a previous court verdict, it was announced on Monday. Judges also massively increased...

Two thirds of the illegal shipments of medical products contained potency preparations for men. Keystone/Alessandro Della Bella Switzerland’s customs and border security authorities have seized more than 230 packages of illegally imported counterfeit medical products. The confiscations were conducted during a week-long international campaign in June against the illegal online trade in fake medicines. Two-thirds of the illegal shipments contained counterfeit erectile...

‘You don’t have dozens and dozens of people employed on your Russia desks if you are not making money in Russia,’ says one senior private banker in Switzerland Keystone / Yuri Kochetkov January used to be a big month for Swiss bankers and their Russian clients. Many of the Moscow elite had made a tradition of coming to the Alps for the orthodox new year, skiing with their families, then catching up with their financial consiglieri. In St Moritz, one banker recalls...

Vincenz is a former Swiss ‘banker of the year’. © Keystone/Michael Buholzer A Swiss court has sentenced former Raiffeisen bank chief Pierin Vincenz to almost four years in prison for fraud, forgery of documents and criminal mismanagement. Judges on Wednesday handed down a jail sentence of 43 months as well as a suspended fine of CHF840,000 ($899,858). Vincenz was also ordered to refund CHF236,000. He was accused of making millions through illicit deals while he was...

Anyone using the internet is being watched, and possibly manipulated, via a trail of digital breadcrumbs known as metadata. Two Swiss companies, one backed by former United States military whistleblower Chelsea Manning, are setting up smokescreens to confuse prying eyes and protect web users from big tech companies and government surveillance. Nym Technologies and HOPR employ mix networks (mixnet) to churn together the metadata that people leave behind when they...

Convicted fraudster Dieter Behring standing outside a Swiss courthouse during his trial in 2016. © Keystone / Ti-press / Pablo Gianinazzi Administrators clearing up a CHF800 million ($877 million) collapsed pyramid scheme have managed to recover just CHF12.7 million from one of Switzerland’s largest fraud cases. Financier Dieter Behring ripped off 1,700 investors between 1998 and 2004External link with a scam that promised oversized financial returns. Instead, it...

According to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, the hacking and insider trading scheme made a total of $82 million from 2018 through 2020. Keystone / Anonymous The Russian businessman extradited from Switzerland to the United States and four other Russians have been charged with carrying out a $82-million (CHF75 million) insider trading scheme using data stolen during hacks of US computer networks. US federal prosecutors in Boston announcedExternal link on...

UBS maintains that the evidence presented in court was insufficient to show guilt. Keystone / Sebastian Gollnow Switzerland’s largest bank, UBS, says it will once again appeal a fine handed out by a French court for tax evasion offences. On December 13, a Paris appeal court confirmed a previous ruling that UBS was criminally guilty of assisting French tax evaders but reduced the penalty from €4.5 billion (CHF4.7 billion) to €1.8 billionExternal link. The bank, which...