US senator asks Credit Suisse banker

Credit Suisse faces the wrath of a Senate hearing over alleged attempts to conceal up to $10bn from the taxman

The Swiss banker passed through US customs, pretending he was visiting America to attend the wedding of one of his client’s children. He did attend the marriage but not to toast the happy couple, as he claimed. His primary mission was to brief the client about secret funds he had stashed overseas, out of the way of the American government. Separately, a banker named Michele Bergantino invited one of his wealthy customers to breakfast at New York’s plush Mandarin Oriental hotel. As the pair chatted, the banker slipped a set of accounts across the table, hidden discreetly inside the pages of a magazine,

Sports Illustrated. It was typical of the way Mr Bergantino liked to conduct business. Later, when he hosted the client in Switzerland, he eschewed his official office, and instead met the client in an anonymous white room, accessed by a secret lift that did not have any buttons. “These instances belong in a spy novel, not at one of the world’s top banks,” Senator John McCain said on Wednesday. He has a point. But however much they may feel like they belong to the realm of fiction, these James Bond-style scenarios were part of a very real tax avoidance scheme orchestrated by Credit Suisse...............Read more here