Swiss financial sector
Key highlights
Banking secrecy
• Private Banks’ foreign subsidiaries captured a large part of money repatriated after various amnesties
• Renewed interest in moving tax-declared money to Switzerland mainly coming from EU countries
• Hope that the automatic data exchange could be avoided
Basel III
• Set of rules on raising the quality, consistency and transparency of bank capital not implemented before 2012
• Introduction of some counter-cyclical rules forcing banks to build buffers in the good times
• Market pressure already forced the banking system to raise the level and quality of the capital and liquidity
and be more cautious with leverage
• In Switzerland, macro-risks posed by financial intermediaries require reforms to be implemented earlier
• Therefore, capital adequacy and leverage ratios for the two big banks close to the highest ratios of major
international banks
UBS Federal investigation
• The Swiss Parliament scheduled to vote on the US-Swiss Government Agreement regarding the exchange
of US taxpayer information over 4’500 accounts to the US Tax Authorities in accordance with agreement
signed last August
• Upper house of Parliament already voted in favor of the hand over, while the Lower House backed the
UBS/US treaty on June 15in in its second vote called again for a referendum, sending the deal back to the
upper house and delaying a binding decision
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