瑞银在法国税务欺诈案被罚款45亿欧元后提出上诉

巴黎（路透社） - 法国一家法院判定瑞士银行瑞银集团（UBS AG）犯有非法招揽客户和洗钱逃税的罪行，并要求其支付45亿欧元（51亿美元）的罚款。

周三的裁决后，瑞士银行股价下跌3.2％。瑞银否认有任何不法行为，表示将发起上诉。

法院总裁克里斯蒂娜·梅在她的裁决中说：“法院只能断定（瑞银）一贯将自己的经济利益置于法国国家的主权权利之上。”

“因此，这些罪行非常严重，”她补充说。

该案例显示了法国法院对金融不端行为以及特别是税务欺诈的严厉态度。

该审判将受到欧洲银行家的严格审视。这些银行家受到监管机构的压力，被要求加强对金融危机以来洗钱规则的遵守。

“这对所有金融中介都是一个明确的信号：如果你不作为，你将受到严厉的惩罚，”巴黎万神殿阿萨斯大学的银行法教授Thierry Bonneau说。

“在所有这些税务欺诈问题上，他们必须极为谨慎。”

超过该银行去年净利润的罚款，包括37亿欧元罚款和8亿欧元带给法国的额外损失。瑞银上个月报告2018年净利润为49亿美元。

“这个决定是不可理解的，我们会上诉，”瑞银总法律顾问Markus Diethelm在法庭外告诉记者。“我们没有看到任何事实和证据。”

上诉可能会使案件拖延多年，在所有上诉完成审理之前，银行不必支付任何费用。

合并罚款创法国的记录。该银行已拨出24.6亿美元，以备弥补诉讼和监管要求可能造成的损失。而罚款是24.6亿美元的两倍以上。

该银行可能不得不在未来几周内增加其拨备，花旗在给投资者的一份报告中称，其今年回购价值高达10亿美元股票的计划会面临风险。


文件图片：2018年10月25日在瑞士苏黎世所见到的瑞士银行标识. REUTERS / Arnd Wiegmann /文件照片

“产业化”规模洗钱

法国的这次审判类似于在美国发生的案件，在美国瑞银在2009年接受了7.8亿美元的庭外和解，而在德国则同意在2014年达成3亿欧元的罚款。

根据欧洲标准，罚款会很高，虽然2015年在美国法院美国法官已经征收89亿美元更高的罚款，令BNP Paribas银行支付违反美国对苏丹，古巴和伊朗的经济制裁的费用。

Bonneau表示，瑞银案中的罚款规模将推动银行在未来的案件中接受和解，这是美国的一种标准做法，在法国很少见。

该裁决标志着七年调查及中止和解谈判后导致事件发展到极点。

法国检察官表示，瑞银派遣瑞士银行家参加高尔夫锦标赛，古典音乐会和狩猎派对，非法招揽新客户，并建议他们将钱存入瑞士，并向他们提供防护法国税务人员行动的盾牌。

检察官告诉法庭，瑞银对逃税客户的支持是“系统性的”，税务欺诈所得的洗黑钱是以“产业化”规模进行的。

瑞银的律师表示，检方未能显示有关具体案件中为客户提供逃避纳税建议的重要证据。

根据法国法律，被判犯有洗钱罪的人可以被判处洗钱总额一半的罚款。检方估计，瑞银的客户向法国税务机关隐瞒了数十亿欧元。

检察官告诉法庭，瑞银的银行家会在没有任何标识的情况下交出名片，并使用带有软件的计算机，这些软件可以快速删除数据。

瑞银的律师此前曾表示，此案已被政治化。该银行拒绝了11亿欧元的庭外和解。

瑞银的法国部门也被判定支付1500万欧元，而被指控的六名前瑞银高管中有五名被判处缓刑，罚款金额从50,000欧元到300,000欧元不等。

Inti Landauro，Emmanuel Jarry和Angelika Gruber报道; Richard Lough编辑，Leigh Thomas，Keith Weir

路透社 英文版中文翻译 2019.02.20

UBS to appeal after fined 4.5 billion euros in French tax fraud case

PARIS (Reuters) - A French court found Swiss bank UBS AG guilty of illegally soliciting clients and laundering the proceeds of tax evasion, ordering it to pay 4.5 billion euros ($5.1 billion) in penalties.

Shares in the Swiss bank fell as much as 3.2 percent after the ruling on Wednesday. UBS, which has denied any wrongdoing, said it would launch an appeal.

“The court can only conclude that (UBS) consistently put its own financial interests over the sovereign rights of the French state,” the court’s president Christine Mee said in her ruling.

“Hence, the crimes are exceptionally serious,” she added.

The case shows how French courts are taking a hard line on financial misconduct in general, and tax fraud in particular.

The trial will be scrutinized by European bankers who have come under pressure from regulators to tighten compliance with money laundering rules since the financial crisis.

“This is a clear signal to all financial intermediaries: you will be punished severely if you don’t behave,” said banking law professor Thierry Bonneau from Paris Pantheon Assas University.

“They will have to be excessively prudent on all these questions of tax fraud.”

The penalties, which exceed the bank’s net profit last year, included a 3.7 billion euro fine and additional damages of 800 million euros to the French state. UBS last month reported a 2018 net profit of $4.9 billion.

“This decision is incomprehensible, we will appeal,” UBS general counsel Markus Diethelm told reporters outside the courtroom. “We have seen no facts and no evidence.”

An appeal could see the case drag on for years and the bank will not have to pay anything until all appeals are heard.

The combined penalties are a record for France and more than double the $2.46 billion the bank has set aside to cover potential losses from litigation and regulatory requirements.

The bank may have to increase its provisions in the coming weeks, Citi said in a note to investors and its plan to buy back as much as $1 billion worth of shares this year is at risk, it added.


FILE PHOTO: The logo of Swiss bank UBS is seen in Zurich, Switzerland October 25, 2018. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann/File Photo

“INDUSTRIAL” SCALE LAUNDERING

The French trial follows a similar case in the United States, where UBS accepted a $780 million settlement in 2009, and in Germany, where it agreed to a 300 million euro fine in 2014.

The penalty is high by European standards, although in the United States judges have levied higher fines including the $8.9 billion a U.S. court in 2015 ordered BNP Paribas to pay for violating U.S. economic sanctions against Sudan, Cuba and Iran.

The size of the penalty in the UBS case will push banks to accept settlements in future cases, a standard practice in the United States that is rare in France, Bonneau said.

The ruling marks the culmination of a seven-year investigation and aborted settlement negotiations.

French prosecutors said UBS sent Swiss bankers to golf tournaments, classical music concerts and hunting parties to solicit new clients illegally and advised them to park their money in Switzerland and offered them methods to shield activities from the French taxman.

UBS was “systematic” in its support to tax-evading customers and that the laundering of proceeds from the tax fraud was done on an “industrial” scale, the prosecutors had told the court.

UBS’s lawyers have said the prosecution failed to show material evidence of specific cases of clients advised to evade tax payments.

Under French law, those convicted of money laundering can be ordered to pay a fine totaling half the amount laundered. The prosecution estimates UBS’s customers hid billions of euros from the French tax authorities.

Prosecutors told the court that UBS’s bankers would hand over business cards without any logo and used computers which carried software allowing data to be quickly erased.

Lawyers for UBS have previously said the case had become politicized. The bank turned down a settlement offer of 1.1 billion euros.

UBS’s French unit was also convicted to pay 15 million euros, while five of the six former UBS executives charged were given suspended prison terms and fines ranging from 50,000 euros to 300,000 euros.

Reporting by Inti Landauro, Emmanuel Jarry and Angelika Gruber; Editing by Richard Lough, Leigh Thomas, Keith Weir

Reuters 2019.02.20