Leak Reveals How Swiss Bank Hid Wealth of Clients Engaged in Criminal Activity

It contains the details of accounts linked to 30,000 Credit Suisse clients all over the globe.

Credit Suisse is the second-largest Swiss bank. Image used for representative purposes.

(Photo: iStock)

A leak from one of the world's biggest private banks, Credit Suisse, exposed the hidden wealth of clients involved in criminal activity like torture, drug trafficking, and money laundering among others.

The leak contains the details of accounts linked to 30,000 Credit Suisse clients all over the globe and pointed towards due diligence failures by Credit Suisse.

Information about the leak was provided to The Guardian and other media organisations that are part of a consortium to which this information was provided.

Credit Suisse in a statement rejected the allegations, further adding that the country's strict banking secrecy laws barred it from publicly talking about the cases of individual clients.

"Credit Suisse strongly rejects the allegations and inferences about the bank’s purported business practices", the statement read.

The statement also said that reports containing the leaks consisted of "selective information taken out of context, resulting in tendentious interpretations of the bank’s business conduct".

It also said that many of the allegations were regarding cases that were active many years ago, when "laws, practices and expectations of financial institutions were very different from where they are now".

According to the leaks, some of the countries with the largest number of Credit Suisse clients who were allegedly engaged in criminal activity were Egypt, Thailand, Ukraine, and Venezuela.