GENEVA. SWITZERLAND – A Swiss-based currency trader, Kai H, lost a case Monday 26 March where he claimed investment bank JP Morgan owed him millions. He sought 10 times what the bank said it promised to pay him when it hired him in 2010. The trader filed the claim in London’s Queens Court division of the high court based on a typographical error in his salary contract.
KH, who is reported by Bloomberg to have been working at Swiss bank UBS, signed a contract in June 2010 with the New York-based firm to relocate to Johannesburg, South Africa, for a salary of 24 million rand (about US$3.1 million) instead of the 2.4 million rand that had been agreed, according to the bank’s account.
After realizing the mistake, Kai did not show up for work. JP Morgan retracted its offer soon after Kai began legal proceedings.
Judge Henry Globe in London, who heard the case, reportedly stated Monday (there is no written record of his ruling) that Kai had taken a “commercial risk of accepting the offer, knowing full well that the figure was an error”.
Swiss financial publication Finews, which picked up the story from Bloomberg, says no one seems to know if the trader has found work since being laid off by Credit Suisse as part of a batch of job cuts in late 2011. Before that he was reportedly unemployed after filing his lawsuit.
Xherdan Shaqiri, moving to Munich from Basel in 2012 (photo, Wikipedia)
BASEL, SWITZERLAND – Months of speculation in the football world ended Thursday 9 February with the announcement by football club Bayern Munich that it has signed Swiss player Xherdan Shaqiri to a four-year contract.
The transfer from FC Basel 1893 takes place 1 July 2012.
Shaqiri, an international player who plays for Basel in the Swiss Super League as well as on the national team, is just 5-foot six tall.
The midfielder was described as “one of the most sought-after talents in European football” by Bayern director of sport Christian Nerlinger.
The 20-year-old grew up in Basel and in January 2009, despite being wooed by other clubs, he signed his first professional contract with FC Basel.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Swiss watchmaking giant Swatch has ended its three-year-old joint venture with Tiffany, US jewelry company, citing contractual problems. The Swiss company accused Tiffany of continually blocking development of the Tiffany watch project.
“This action became necessary following Tiffany & Co’s systematic efforts to block and delay development of the business”, the Swatch Group said in a statement issued 12 September. “Within the framework of the long-term partnership agreement, in spring 2008, Swatch Group founded Tiffany Watch Co. Ltd, which was responsible for the development, production and distribution of “Tiffany & Co.” branded watches. Worldwide sales were handled through points of sale operated by Tiffany & Co., by The Swatch Group Ltd and by independent retailers.
“Tiffany Watch Co. Ltd. will be permitted to wind down current business over the course of two years following effective termination of the cooperation contracts.
“Swatch Group and Tiffany Watch Co. Ltd. will press claims for damages against Tiffany & Co., New York, in compensation for the loss of planned long-term future business.”
The contract was to last for 20 years, with an option for an additional 10.
The end of the affair is a quick turn-around from the upbeat tone of the 2008 announcemet of the project by the Swatch Group. “The enormous prestige of the Tiffany & Co. brand and the Swatch Group’s watchmaking expertise and experience in the luxury segment form a powerful platform on which to build one of the world’s top luxury watchmakers.”
At 14:45 Monday the shares were down 2.35 percent, in line with the overall Swiss stock market decline.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Ottmar Hitzfeld, German coach who took Switzerland’s football team to the World Cup in 2010, will stay on until the summer of 2014, the Swiss Football Federation announced Thursday 10 March. Hitzfeld is widely considered one of Germany’s most successful football coaches; he joined the Swiss team in 2008 for a contract until 2012.
He will now stay on long enough to see Switzerland into the next World Cup if the team qualifies.
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – A scam that has resulted in hundreds of thousands of Swiss francs being lost by small businesses in canton Fribourg in recent weeks has now spread to canton Vaud, say cantonal police.
Small businesses and craftsman are the target: they receive by mail their company’s supposed entry in what appears to be an official register or yearbook, are asked to correct it and/or sign it and send it back to a fax number that starts with the Geneva prefix of 022.
They are then billed exorbitant amounts for the update and if they complain they are sent threatening letters by lawyers.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Tribune de Geneve 14 January carries a report on a motion filed by a group of centre-right politicians for the canton to adopt a contract with foreign residents.One part of the contract would call for foreigners to learn French.
Six German-speaking cantons, including Zurich, have been using similar contracts on a trial basis to encourage better integration of foreigners.
The Geneva newspaper cites Rolin Wavre, secretary-general of the Radical Party as saying that “members of international Geneva”, which generally refers to people working in international organizations, would not be affected: the move is aimed at foreigners who are either new to the canton or long-time residents who have never learned French.
First-ever principal guest conductor
8 October: Neeme Jaervi named music, artistic director
Kazuki Yamada (photo, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande / Yves Petit)
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Kazuki Yamada, young star on the international orchetral concert circuit, has been named the first-ever principal guest conductor with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (OSR) since the orchestra was created in 1918. He has signed a three-year contract to lead the orchestra for 10 concerts a year, a minimum of five weeks, starting in September 2012.
The maestro was approached by the orchestra’s foundation in June 2010 to take on the role of music director, but, the OSR said Wednesday 22 September, “After a thorough reflection on the various requirements of this position, the OSR Foundation, together with Maestro Kazuki Yamada, have mutually agreed on a collaboration” with the 31-year-old conductor as principal guest conductor.
Yamada makes his debut with several major international orchestras during the 2010-2011 season: in London with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at Barbican Hall, in Paris debut with the Orchestre de Paris and in Berlin with Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester Berlin.
The foundation also announced Wednesday that it is proposing Neeme Jaervi as artistic and music director. The orchesta’s musicians will vote on the proposal at a meeting 8 October. (update 8 October: the nomination was accepted and Jaervi will lead the orchestra starting January 2011.
If approved, Jaervi would also start a three-year contract in September 2012. Jaervi, born in Estonia, is just starting a new contract in September 2010 as music director of the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. He has been a guest conductor in major orchestras around the world and has appeared several times with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande.
Domestic workers are not mopping up, when it comes to decent wages
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland’s household help is likely to be covered by a minimum wage contract, thanks to the Schengen Accord on the free movement of people in Europe. A committee reviewing the situation of various cross-border workers is recommending that Switzerland adopt a typical household worker contract with minimum wage, for anyone working at least five hours a week for the same employer. Babysitters, minors and family members or partners would be excluded from the coverage.
Visa goes to Rio
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The International Olympic Committee in Lausanne and Visa International have extended Visa’s sponsorship agreement to 2020, the two announced 27 October. Visa was one of the founding members of the worldwide TOP Olympic Games partners programme in 1986. The agreement means that Visa is the only official payment services card accepted by the Olympic Games.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Details are surfacing slowly but steadily in the strange saga of the two Swiss men held by the Libyan government and Switzerland’s efforts to bring them home. The latest wrinkle is that the Swiss government has confirmed media reports from Wednesday 9 September that one of the two has had private contacts with the family of the Libyan prime minister and that he is living some 200 km from Tripoli, but reports in regularly to the Swiss embassy. The other man, ABB employee Max Goeldi, has opted to live at the embassy, and he has accepted the embassy’s offer to give him small amounts of work to do to fill his time.
Earlier media reports and government information indicated that the two men have been living at the Swiss embassy in Tripoli.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss government late Friday issued a statement emphasizing that it is implementing every detail of its agreement with Libya as rapidly as possible to ensure the safe return of two businessmen who have been held in Libya since July 2008. The Libyan government has, for its part, supplied a written statement that it will allow the men to leave by the end of August.
The Swiss military plane that landed in Libya to pick up the two men returned in the early hours of Friday without the men - but carrying the luggage, according to the official Swiss statement, without clarifying why the luggage was sent on.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Libya’s government has signed the contract drawn up 20 August between Switzerland and Libya, TSR, Swiss television, reports Jana, the official Libyan news agency, as saying. The Swiss Federal Council approved it earlier this week. The signing in Tripoli appears to be the final step needed for two Swiss men held in the country since July 2008 to leave. A Swiss Federal Council plane and delegation are waiting for them in Tripoli.
Related: Jana, 20 August, on the contract
Update 19:00 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Two Swiss men who have been held in Libya and living at the Swiss Embassy in Tripoli since July 2008, and who were expected to fly home Tuesday, are still in Libya. The Swiss government raised its veil of silence late Wednesday 26 August with a statement on the situation, noting that “The Libyan Prime Minister informed the President in writing this morning that it was only a matter of time before the administrative procedures required in Libya were finalised.” The two businessmen have been issued exit visas to leave the country.
The men are now awaiting permission from Libyan judicial authorities to take a plane back to Switzerland. A team from the Swiss president’s office is in Tripoli waiting to accompany them.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The curious and much-publicized case of the Swiss president apparently deciding unilaterally to apologize to Libya’s leader Mouammar Qadaffi over the arrest of the latter’s son in Geneva in July 2008 is taking another turn. TSR television reports that a Swiss government airplane has left Bern for Libya, possibly to pick up two Swiss men who have been held hostage there for more than a year.
