BSI

Federal prosecutors on Tuesday charged a Spanish-Swiss banker with laundering $21.7 million in graft money for Brazilian clients involved in the country’s largest corruption scandal, including jailed former lower house speaker Eduardo Cunha, Reuters reported.

The former relationship manager of Zurich-based BSI bank, was arrested at Sao Paulo’s Guarulhos airport as he got off a flight from Switzerland on Nov. 27 and is being held in Curitiba, the centre of the so-called Car Wash investigation.

Singapore banned two more financial professionals over breaches related to 1Malaysia Development Bhd., taking to eight the number of prohibitions handed down by the city in connection with the troubled state investment fund, Blooomberg reported on Tuesday.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore issued a lifetime prohibition order on former private banker Yeo Jiawei and placed a three-year ban on Kevin Scully, the former chief executive officer of NRA Capital Pte, it said Tuesday.

Former BSI banker Yeo Jiawei was on Wednesday sentenced to four-and-a-half years jail for money laundering and cheating, in a case linked to an investigation involving Malaysian state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

Yeo, 34, had set up multiple suspicious transactions involving 1MDB, and admitted he secretly profited at least $3.5 million from the illicit transactions. He laundered a portion of the money by transferring at least $500,000 into his parents’ bank account.

Prosecutors identified Yeo as a central figure linked to Malaysian financier Low Taek Jho, who was characterised by US investigators as the controller of a plan to drain billions from 1MDB.

EFG International said Italy’s central bank wants it out of Milan and Como in connection with alleged compliance weaknesses at recently-acquired Banca della Svizzera Italiana, or BSI.

The Zurich-based private bank, under Greek Latsis family control, referred it is in close contact with Banca d’Italia over the closing of its BSI acquisition, and in a statement late on Friday, it said: "EFG International announces that BSI has received a notification by Banca d’Italia requesting the implementation of certain measures, which may result in a closure of the BSI offices in Milan and Como."

EFG International completed the integration of Ticino’s private bank BSI, the bank it bought last year, according to a statement today.

With the transaction, BSI (Europe) was renamed into EFG Bank (Luxembourg). The company henceforth will use the EFG brand only. In Switzerland, almost all branches and offices have already been rebranded with the new logo. The rebranding of global locations will follow regional timelines.

Finally, the integration of the Swiss business of Banca Svizzera Italiana (BSI) into EFG Bank has been completed. From this moment, the majority of the customer relationships and employees of BSI are transferred, as EFG referred in a media release. The combined business will now be launched on the market under the name EFG.

EFG International said it completed the legal integration of "substantially all" of BSI SA’s Swiss business into EFG Bank AG, a 100 percent subsidiary of EFG International. The remaining BSI entities in Luxembourg and Monaco are expected to be integrated in the course of the second quarter of 2017, EFG said.

EFG International is gearing up for a battle with Brazil’s Grupo BTG Pactual SA over the value of BSI Bank, with the Swiss private bank now expecting to cut the purchase price by more than a quarter: it expects a downward adjustment of the estimated BSI purchase price of 277.5 million francs.

The bank cautioned this was "subject to BTG’s expected objection and, if necessary, verification by an independent expert".
The private bank that bought BSI last year reported IFRS net profit of 339.3 million Swiss francs ($336.27 million) in 2016, far ahead of the average estimate of 13.8 million in a Reuters survey of four analysts.

Singapore has reportedly seized a $35 million private jet belonging to 1MDB mastermind Low Taek Jho, also known as Jho Low, who is under investigation for his involvement in the scandal-hit Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB)

The Bombardier Global 5000 jet is part of some $1 billion in assets allegedly acquired with funds siphoned from 1MDB fund that the US government is moving to seize. The police declined to comment on whether the authorities had grounded the plane, stating that investigations are still in progress.

The US alleges that the funds were laundered through the US banking system and is seeking to confiscate Low’s private jet, as well as other properties including a $100-million interest in EMI Music Publishing Group, and a $380-million stake in the Park Lane Hotel in New York.