New York
CNN Business
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Credit Suisse pushed back Sunday after a number of media shops reported that the Swiss funding financial institution had purchasers that included criminals, alleged human rights abusers and events dealing with sanctions.
“Credit Suisse strongly rejects the allegations and insinuations about the bank’s purported business practices,” the financial institution said in a news release Sunday. “The matters presented are predominantly historical, in some cases dating back as far as the 1940s, and the accounts of these matters are based on partial, inaccurate, or selective information taken out of context, resulting in tendentious interpretations of the bank’s business conduct.”
The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, a non-profit reporting platform, mentioned in a information launch {that a} whistleblower leaked info to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. The OCCRP mentioned that its investigation checked out information from greater than 18,000 accounts value greater than $100 billion, opened between the 1940s and the 2010s.
Süddeutsche Zeitung and 46 different information organizations — together with The New York Times and The Guardian — collaborated on the evaluation and reported particulars of the information in an investigation titled “Suisse Secrets.”
The OCCRP and Süddeutsche Zeitung coordinated the challenge.
The OCCRP launch mentioned the challenge’s reporting signifies that the financial institution’s purchasers embody a “Yemeni spy chief implicated in torture” and Venezuelan officers accused of corruption, amongst others.
“I’ve too often seen criminals and corrupt politicians who can afford to keep on doing business as usual, no matter what the circumstances, because they have the certainty that their ill-gotten gains will be kept safe and always within their reach,” mentioned OCCRP co-founder Paul Radu in an announcement.
In an announcement supplied by the OCCRP, the whistleblower who supplied the knowledge mentioned Swiss banking secrecy legal guidelines are “immoral” and allow corruption.
Credit Suisse mentioned Sunday that about 90% of the accounts talked about are closed or had been within the course of of closing earlier than the challenge’s reporting and that it has taken vital steps to fight monetary crime within the final decade. Although it mentioned it can’t remark on potential shopper relationships, the financial institution confirmed it’s taking motion “in line with applicable policies and regulatory requirements.”
“These media allegations appear to be a concerted effort to discredit not only the bank but the Swiss financial market-place as a whole, which has undergone significant changes over the last several years,” the financial institution mentioned Sunday.