After being rescued by UBS last month, Credit Suisse (CSGN.S) is set to confront shareholder fury at its final annual general meeting on Tuesday (UBSG.S).
Switzerland’s emergency statute allowed Zurich-based UBS to take over Credit Suisse without Credit Suisse shareholders’ consent, destroying their interests.
The conference symbolizes the humiliating end of the 167-year-old flagship bank created by Alfred Escher, a Swiss billionaire known as King Alfred I, who built the country’s railways and, subsequently, the bank.
Protesters erected a capsized boat outside the music venue where the conference was held to symbolize the bank’s doom.
As it prepared to question senior executives at the meeting, shareholder advice company Ethos criticized the “greed and ineptitude of its managers” and “unimaginable heights” of remuneration.
“Shareholders have lost large sums of money and thousands of jobs are at risk,” it warned.
Following years of controversy and losses, Credit Suisse was nearly bankrupt when the Swiss government rescued it through a merger with UBS.
Chairman Axel Lehmann and CEO Ulrich Koerner will address shareholders for the first time since the takeover.
Credit Suisse was reorganizing after Silicon Valley Bank collapsed in the U.S.
UBS bought Credit Suisse for 3 billion Swiss francs ($3.3 billion) after a run on deposits.
Switzerland and stockholders were outraged. Political research firm gifs. Bern reported that most Swiss opposed the transaction.
“The government’s use of emergency powers to force this arrangement through goes beyond legal and democratic standards,” said Dominik Gross of the Swiss Alliance of Development Organisations.
“Switzerland taxpayers too are on the hook for billions of francs of garbage investments and yet the government, (regulator) FINMA and the central bank have offered no explanation regarding the state’s 9 billion loss guarantee to UBS.”
One of the world’s largest investors, Norway’s national wealth fund, publicly protested by voting against Lehmann and six other directors’ re-election.
ISS has previously criticized the bank’s management for a “lack of control and bad stewardship.”
Before Tuesday’s meeting, Credit Suisse stated it had removed several recommendations.
Management dismissal is a confidence indicator. It also scrapped a bank transformation bonus.
Credit Suisse’s near collapse also wiped away $17 billion of Additional Tier 1 (AT1) debt.
Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan represents AT1 investors seeking reimbursement.
The attorney general’s office said Sunday that Switzerland’s Federal Prosecutor is investigating the Credit Suisse merger.
The prosecutor is investigating government officials, regulators, and two bank executives for Swiss criminal law violations.
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