UBS head office, Bahnhofstrasse, Zurich, Switzerland
Update 2 Bern, Switzerland / Miami, Florida, USA (GenevaLunch) - Switzerland and the United States appear to have found an out of court settlement for the pending case of the IRS and Swiss bank UBS, with the two governments asking Judge Alan Gold in Miami to close the court case. The pre-arranged phone conversation took place at 15:00 Swiss time Wednesday. No details have been released.
Speculation has centred around a possible conflict over delivery times for the bank to provide names of its clients who are suspected of not respecting US tax laws, but the two sides and the bank have not confirmed this, nor has any information been provided about how many names the bank is likely to deliver to the IRS, US tax authority, which has requested some 52,000 names.
Related: Bloomberg, Financial Times, Le Temps (Fre)
Update 13:45 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The Swiss Federal Council (cabinet) met Monday 10 August in an extraordinary session that had sparked speculation they could be meeting to discuss the ongoing UBS court case in the US. Council members were briefed on the case, Swiss news agency ats was told by the Swiss vice-chancellor, André Simonazzi, who refused any further comment and insisted that no further information will be provided until the negotiations between the US and Switzerland for an out of court settlement are concluded.
UBS not mentioned, but Swiss cabinet takes economic measures to fight crisis
Instead, the Council took steps to create the necessary legal base that will allow the Swiss parliament to put in place a series of measures to help the country cope with the economic crisis.
Miami, Florida, USA (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss and US governments are still negotiating a settlement in the UBS bank court case and have asked for a delay until late morning, Florida time, the judge in charge of the case has announced, Bloomberg reports. Any announcement about the outcome will now be made after trading in UBS shares in Zurich have ended for the week.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Parties involved in the negotiations for a settlement in the UBS court case in Miami, Florida, USA – the Swiss and US governments as well as the bank itself – have agreed to total silence on details of the agreement they are working out while the negotiations continue, in theory to 7 August. But the ban on information is not keeping media from speculating, always citing unnamed sources which are usually called sources close to the negotiations.
Washington, DC (GenevaLunch) – Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met in Washington, DC Friday 31 July for their second working visit since March 2009 when the two met in Geneva, Switzerland. The two had little to say to the press following the meeting, followed with more than usual interest because of the announcement earlier in the day that the two governments had reached an Agreement in Principle for an out of court settlement in the UBS bank court case.
According to the Swiss foreign affairs office, the talks covered mainly “the situations in the southern Caucasus, the Near East and the Middle East. Secretary of State Clinton took the opportunity to thank Switzerland for representing the USA in countries such as Iran as well as for Switzerland’s commitment to many internationally important issues, in particular in its role as a mediator.”
UBS case mentioned, not discussed
The Agreement in Principle in the UBS case was mentioned, but was not discussed, with the two saying that teams from the two governments will be working out details of the agreement in the coming week.
Transcript of the post-meeting press briefing in Washington
Video from the US State Department
UBS New York headquarters
Update 3 17:25 Bern and Zurich, Switzerland/Miami, Florida and Washington, DC, USA (GenevaLunch) - Shares in UBS rose more than 4 percent in the minutes following the news that Switzerland and the UBS have reached an Agreement in Principle in the civil case brought by the US Treasury department against Swiss bank UBS. The case will now be settled out of court, the Swiss government says in a statement issued late Friday afternoon. (background)
The two governments have reached an agreement in principle on the major issues in the case involving UBS and the IRS tax authority, US Justice Department attorney Stuart Gibson told the judge presiding over the case Friday 31 July. Neither he nor Judge Alan Gold provided details about the agreement, and the Swiss government says that “confidentiality has been agreed for the full duration of the negotiation process.”
Some early media reports noted that the judge has postponed the evidentiary hearing, whose opening had been delayed to Monday 3 August, until a week later, 10 August, with the parties scheduled to hold a status conference 7 August. But according to the Swiss government, the court has simply asked for an update on the details of the settlement Friday 7 August, and has scheduled a conference for this purpose.
Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meet today in Washington, DC.
Update 15:40 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Swiss authorities are investigating charges by a US man, who has pleaded guilty to tax evasion in the US, that a Swiss government official was bribed to provide his lawyer with information on the UBS court case. The information purportedly indicated, incorrectly, that his name was not among the 250 that UBS would eventually gave to IRS tax authorities in the US.
Reuters notes that bribery is extremely rare in Switzerland and the accusations have prompted concern in Bern, the capital, and among banking circles. Transparency International in its latest (2008) bribe payers’ index, puts Switzerland near the top of the list of relatively corruption-clean countries.
Earlier in the day 29 July Swiss media carried a report from wire service ATS that Alan Gold, the judge in the UBS bank case in the US, has scheduled a meeting by telephone Wednesday with the US Justice Department and Switzerland, to clarify progress being made towards an out of court settlement. The two parties to the case were encouraged by the judge 13 July to explore a settlement in the case where the IRS tax authority is demanding the names of 52,000 holders of UBS bank accounts.
In related news:
- a UBS client in the US, Jeffrey Chernick of New York, Tuesday 28 July pleaded guilty to fiscal fraud, saying that a Swiss lawyer had talked him out of turning himself in and paying back taxes in October 2008. The lawyer, according to Chernick’s court statement, assured him that a Swiss government official said his name was not on a list that would be given by the bank to the IRS. The attorney told Chernick the government official was paid CHF45,000 for the information. Chernick is the third person to plead guilty to tax evasion charges, from the group of 250 whose names were given to the IRS in February. Chicago Tribune and RSR, Fre
- former head of the UBS wealth management unit in the US, Joseph Grano, says that in early 2008, before the bank’s problems with the IRS were public, he wrote to the bank’s then-chairman and president, Marcel Ospel and Marcel Rohner, suggesting they spin off the unit, but they never replied. Bloomberg
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Micheline Calmy-Rey, Switzerland’s minister for foreign affairs, will meet with Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, in Washington, DC, 31 July. The two countries and Swiss bank UBS have been given until 3 August by a US federal court judge in Miami, Florida to find an out-of-court settlement for the IRS legal demand that the bank hand over client information on 52,000 accounts. The Washington Post carries an editorial that says the issue is emotional on both sides:
Update 2, 23:15 Zurich, Switzerland and Miami, Florida, USA (GenevaLunch) – News agency AWP mistakenly published a report Sunday, which was then widely circulated by world media, saying that UBS has been informed by US district court judge Alan Gold in Miami that he will delay hearings scheduled to start tomorrow morning in Miami. The judge is presiding over the case brought by the IRS against the Swiss bank to obtain the names of 52,000 bank clients.
The bank has clarified that a letter written to the judge jointly by the bank and the US government, asking for a delay, will be presented to the judge Monday when the hearing is scheduled to open. The two parties in the case have agreed to ask for the delay to allow the US Justice Department and UBS more time to try to negotiate an out-of-court settlement. Late Sunday night Swiss time the Swiss Foreign Affairs Department confirmed that it supports the request to delay but notes that the negotiations are confidential and no other information will be forthcoming.
Media reports initially noted that the request was filed today, Sunday, which is not correct. AWP/TSR.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Sean and Micheline Connery were cleared of any wrongdoing in a Geneva court where charges had been brought against them by a son of Jean-René Canela, a French property developer. A hearing to determine if there were grounds for a case dismissed the charges. The younger Canela says, according to the UK’s Telegraph, that he will continue his fight.
