By Emma Farge, Reuters
GENEVA, Sept 8 (Reuters) – A former partner of Swiss private bank Mirabaud & Cie, who once headed Switzerland’s banking lobby, has admitted paying tens of millions of dollars in bribes and a verdict is expected in the country’s top criminal court on Tuesday, court documents showed.
Swiss federal prosecutors allege that former partner Pierre Mirabaud made hundreds of payments totalling 82.3 million Swiss francs ($101.7 million) to a Kuwait government official between 2000 and 2012 in exchange for bringing $595.2 million worth of business to the bank, the indictment showed.
“He was aware of the risk associated with these payments and accepted the possible consequences should that risk materialise,” the document said of Mirabaud, 77, who was head of the Swiss Bankers Association from 2003 until 2009.
Mirabaud, who retired from the bank in 2009 and continued as a consultant until 2012, has accepted the key facts of the corruption and money laundering case, the indictment said.
His lawyer declined to provide an immediate comment. The bank, which is not a party to the case, declined to comment.
The Kuwaiti official, now deceased, has already been convicted in absentia while living abroad for corruption and embezzling public money in Kuwait.
The case at the Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona, Switzerland, is an accelerated process and expected to last just one day. It was not immediately clear if Mirabaud would attend.
Corruption and money laundering in Switzerland can carry a fine or a prison sentence of up to five years but prosecutors sought just 24 months, citing Mirabaud’s age, lack of prior convictions and his cooperation with investigators.
Generally, sentences are suspended in Switzerland if there is no perceived risk of the crime being repeated.
Bank Mirabaud, founded in 1819 in Geneva, is one of Switzerland’s oldest private banks and is now run by the seventh generation of the founding family.
Swiss financial market regulator FINMA said in 2024 it had confiscated 12.7 million francs of unlawfully generated profits from the bank over violations of financial market law and breaches of its money-laundering obligations.
The watchdog said its investigation concerned business relationships that at times accounted for almost 10% of the bank’s entire assets under management and was connected with a businessman accused of tax evasion who has since died. FINMA did not disclose the identity of any individuals involved.
Mirabaud said at the time it had been fully cooperative in helping FINMA to resolve the case, which it said “settles the past”.—Reuters
