Three centuries of history of banking secrecy in Switzerland

                                                        I swear to secrecy, and only a secret ..

   Three centuries of history of banking secrecy in Switzerland    |Trois siècles de secret bancaire en Suisse

Banking in Switzerland was born in Geneva, where the first private bankers came about in 1700. They were Protestants, often of French origin and in spite of the persecutions after the abolition of the Edict of Nantes Louis XIV in 1685, secretly and cautiously continued to give loans to the French king and the government: no one was to know that the King Catholic uses money heretics.

Regular customers of one of the Geneva banks was the Emperor Napoleon.

The most famous of the Geneva Protestant bankers - Jacques Necker (1732 - 1804), a native of Geneva, who led the French Treasury and the (three times!), The Ministry of Finance of France. We do know the daughter of Baron Necker, writer, known under the pseudonym of Madame de Stael. She spent a lot of time in Switzerland, living in exile in the castle of his father at Coppet Lausanne. Interestingly, the castle was bought by the family shortly before the storming of the Bastille, where Jacques Necker was suddenly dismissed, and then as quickly - in 3 days - once again returned to the court.

 Also Necker, a brilliant career outside Switzerland are made Swiss bankers, as Pierre-Isaac Tellyusson - led the Bank of England, and Guillaume Mallet who became one of the founders of the Bank of France.

 In 1713, the State Council of Geneva for the first time regulated the concept of banking secrecy. banker's duty was "to register their clients and their transactions. At the same time, however, it is forbidden to transfer such information to third parties except with the express permission of the city government ...

 "The original feature of the Geneva banks had their international activities - foreigners during the political and religious persecution translated their finances to the Confederation, and in addition, Swiss banks were creditors of a number of states. Private banks in Switzerland have played a prominent role in the development of international lending and the stock market. They stood at the origins of the major joint-stock banks, for example, "grain", which gave birth to one of the largest banks in the world, around the work which is now so much controversy, United Bank of Switzerland - UBS - is established in 1872 by private bankers in Basel Syndicate Basler Bankverein.

 In Switzerland, banks are prohibited from disclosing any information about the account of his client who else - no private individual or law enforcement agencies and even the government, Swiss or foreign. For disclosure of the secrets of the Swiss bank deposits Bankers expect fines and imprisonment for up to several months.    

Interestingly, while the Swiss law distinguishes between two concepts: "tax evasion" (omission of information about income or assets in the tax return) and "tax fraud" (it means the falsification of documents). Evasion of taxes uplany crime does not count! It is regarded as "administrative offense".

 Only tax fraud (or other cases related to attracting customers to the criminal liability) may become the basis for the disclosure of bank secrecy. When the Court has to deal with claims of civilians inheritance, divorce or bankruptcy - Swiss justice does not take a financial investigation of all deposits in all banks in Switzerland. Only if the claimant proves that there is a contribution to a particular bank, investigation can go to the end, but this procedure is long and expensive.

... Before 1934 bank secrecy provisions contained in the Civil and Labour Codes Switzerland. Then the Swiss Federal Council adopted the Law "On Banking", which was first clearly stated that banking secrecy - a criminal-legal concept, and its disclosure is subject to criminal sanctions. Why is this law was passed? We can say that under pressure from European neighbors: Germany and France. 

In 1932, as a result of the trial of the Basler Handelsbank affair known that more than 2 thousand French aristocrats had accounts in Swiss banks. This caused a very negative reaction from the French government. 

And in 1934, three citizens of Germany were executed for having each of them a bank account in Switzerland. The Nazi government of Germany obyazyvavalo citizens to declare all their resources from abroad. For those who did not, the law provided for the death penalty. This convinced the Swiss authorities to ensure the adoption of the law on bank secrecy to protect their clients. And in 1937, the country's Criminal Code was supplemented with Article espionage, which was directed against foreign spies, collecting information against the Swiss banks' clients.

 In 1984, the Swiss people again voted overwhelmingly (over 73% of the votes) for the preservation of bank secrecy. Today, according to a survey conducted by a leading newspaper «Blick» country, for the abolition of banking secrecy voted 56% of the people.