Compliance
Regulator Lifts Acquisitions Ban On Julius Baer

The temporary ban was imposed by the watchdog after it found a number of failings at the bank over money laundering controls, linked to cases in Venezuela and the global football organisation, FIFA.
Switzerland’s main financial regulator has lifted a ban on
Julius Baer from
making complex acquisitions. The ban was
imposed in February last year as part of a punishment for
anti-money laundering failings that happened over a nine-year
period.
“Julius Baer has been informed by FINMA that it is formally
lifting the ban imposed in February 2020 on the execution of
acquisitions that led to a significant increase in operating
risks and in organisational complexity,” the Zurich-listed bank
said in a statement yesterday.
The decision by FINMA,
aka Swiss Financial Market And Supervisory Authority, is “based
on a status report from FINMA's mandated auditor, which is
supervising the implementation of the measures ordered by FINMA
and the Bank's own measures”, the bank said.
Last year, the watchdog said that Switzerland’s third-largest
bank had fallen “significantly short” of fighting money
laundering. The failings were linked to alleged corruption cases
involving Venezuelan-owned oil group PDVSA and scandal-hit global
football body FIFA. In recent years the Swiss financial services
industry has been caught up in several global corruption cases
(Petrobras, Odebrecht, 1MDB, Panama Papers, FIFA and PDVSA).
“Julius Baer welcomes the lifting of the ban on complex
acquisitions given the significant progress the bank has made in
strengthening its company-wide risk management, particularly with
regard to money laundering prevention,” it added.