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As the father of the rip-off initiative, the partyless Council of States Thomas Minder (62, SH) is a tough critic of the big banks. Just in the spring session, he introduced a proposal demanding that the federal government and the national bank no longer be allowed to bail out private financial institutions through extraordinary special measures. All the greater is his anger at the support plan for Credit Suisse presented on Sunday.
BLICK: Mr. Minder, the grounding of Swissair in 2001 was the trigger for your scam. How do you rate the CS case?
Thomas Less: We are currently experiencing a CS ground. And that irritates me enormously, because there have been enough warners in recent decades. The board of directors cannot go unpunished. So far no one has been held accountable – not at Swissair, not at UBS and now not at CS. You should blame the board of directors of CS. Unfortunately, this is not possible in Switzerland. You should change that.
How?
Organ liability extends to private assets. I’ve been asking for that for a long time. It cannot be that these people are not prosecuted for such distortions and errors. It’s not just stupidity behind it, it’s criminal energy. If I had enough money, I would start a new citizens’ initiative.
They locate the error in the board. Shouldn’t Finma or the National Bank have intervened sooner?
The main responsibility lies with the board of directors. He is in charge and must provide control. But Finma can also be wiped out if she doesn’t look closer. Likewise the accountants or the rating agencies, who did not want to see anything. But the big banks are so opaque with life-threatening products that no one understands them anymore. The Board of Directors must take its responsibility for this.
UBS acquires CS. Is this the right solution?
No definitely not! Instead of solving the too-big-to-fail problem, the federal government is enabling an even bigger elephant wedding. A new gigantic organization is being formed. It is always big banks that shake the global economy.
The federal government will pay in billions if necessary.
That’s a big mistake. The federal government should not bail out such an idiotic company! A bank should be allowed to fail – just like any other company. Saving CS with tax money sends the wrong signal. Every franc the federal government invests here hurts me.
The federal government needs to think about the economic consequences. He can’t drop the CS.
UBS should not have been bailed out in 2008 and should have gone bankrupt. And so far the measure has yielded nothing. There is no stabilization. There is panic all over the world when you look at the share prices of the bank stocks.
Now the shareholders have to bleed. You have no say in the deal.
This is almost an expropriation by emergency law. I find that unbelievable. It affects everyone because our money is also invested in CS through the AHV fund and pension funds. I also own some shares of CS to participate in the annual general meeting.
Shareholders are partly to blame for the misery because they let the CS superiors do it.
Of course, the shareholders are partly to blame. They chose the wrong people and swung through excessive fees for years.
Then your rip-off initiative was a hit?
I can’t understand how CS shareholders repeatedly discharged the board of directors and waived high fees even in the face of the greatest mismanagement. Apparently you also have to patronize the shareholders. As owners, the shareholders actually share the responsibility. But I emphasize again: the Board of Directors bears the main responsibility for the disaster.
CS shareholders will receive about 76 centimes per share. Are you okay with that?
No, you should leave the price to the market. It is unbelievable that the state is keeping this broken bank alive. Federal Bern will still be very active there.
what needs to be done A requirement is, for example, a higher equity.
Higher equity or risk-weighted equity yields nothing. This is complete nonsense. We need to solve the too-big-to-fail problem by breaking up the big banks. That means: UBS must also be broken up. One possibility is a separate banking system. A larger bank is no longer possible. Imagine: what happens if UBS also gets into trouble? We must prevent another bank from being bailed out by the state ever again. A rescue operation is needed.
Do we also need a parliamentary committee of inquiry (PUK)?
I’m a little devastated about that. Probably not. But what we need to look at is the application of the emergency law. It’s actually from wartime. But more recently we have used it with Swissair, UBS, the Corona Pandemic and now CS. We need to regulate the emergency law more precisely. It is unacceptable for the Federal Council to resort to it just because CS has suffered a breach of trust.
Source:Blick
I am Liam Livingstone and I work in a news website. My main job is to write articles for the 24 Instant News. My specialty is covering politics and current affairs, which I’m passionate about. I have worked in this field for more than 5 years now and it’s been an amazing journey. With each passing day, my knowledge increases as well as my experience of the world we live in today.
