The nation’s financial industry association has revealed that wealthy Russians have stashed up to $213bn in Swiss banks.
The Swiss Bankers Association (SBA) confirmed to newsmen that it estimated that between 150 billion and 200 billion Swiss francs ($213bn) of Russian money is held within Swiss vaults.
However, a report indicated that there is far more Russian wealth stored within Switzerland, the world’s biggest center for offshore wealth, than within several financial firms that have recently reported their Russian exposure.
It is important to note that the SBA’s revelations are unusual for Switzerland, which has built up an offshore empire on its banking secrecy and has previously refused to cooperate on transparency requests, and follow its decision to end its famously neutral stance and apply European Union sanctions on Russian assets as a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The report said there is growing debate in Switzerland over how the country should address the Russian issue, with the co-president of the country’s Social Democrats, Mattea Meyer, calling for a crackdown on Russian oligarch cash deposited in Switzerland.
While stating that ‘Part belongs to oligarchs loyal to the Kremlin. The money and their activity … helps finance the war,’ she added that Switzerland ‘must do everything possible to turn off the money taps.’
Delineating on the development, the SBA emphasized that the $213bn figure was small compared to overall assets held in Swiss banks, which have long been considered a safe haven for the world’s wealthy elite to store their wealth.
The SBA added that “The share of assets held for Russian clients likely accounts for a share in the low single-digit percentage range of the total cross-border assets deposited with Swiss banks”.
