Swiss private bank Maerki Baumann & Co has reached resolution with the US Department of Justice (DoJ) over the tax evasion cases under the department’s Swiss bank programme.
The bank has agreed to pay a penalty of more than $23m to the US to avoid prosecution over allegations that it helped US citizens avoid paying taxes.
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Under the deal, the bank will also cooperate in any related criminal or civil proceedings and demonstrate its implementation of controls to prevent misconduct involving undeclared US accounts and pay penalties.
The US DoJ in a statement said that the bank held a total of 571 US related accounts with approximately $790m in assets under management including assets of declared accounts since 1 August 2008.
The bank opened maintained and serviced accounts for US persons as well as offered several Swiss banking services including hold mail instructions and numbered accounts that assisted US clients hide assets from the IRS.
Maerki Baumann increased its focus on its US cross-border business by hiring a relationship manager (RM-1) from the US/Canada desk at another bank in 2003. The bank also hired another relationship manager (RM-2) in 2005 to provide expertise to the US side of its Swiss/US team and actively recruit additional US clients.
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By GlobalDataThe department added that the bank and its relationship managers processed requests from US taxpayers for cash or precious metal withdrawals, permitted withdrawal of CHF1m from a US client’s account, offered cash withdrawals to US clients in Switzerland and offered credit, debit or travel cash cards.
