61340 Vorabseiten_e - Unabhängige Expertenkommission Schweiz

of the assets purchased from Speyer, also founding the Custodian Trust
Company in Charlottetown. 25 Credit Suisse’s hesitation in buying a Jewish bank
may have been due to an ingrained anti-Semitism, but was no doubt chiefly
motivated by the fear that purchasing such a firm might have had a negative
effect on its relations with German firms and the German authorities. One
participant in the discussions held in December 1938 remarked that the takeover
of a Jewish bank would damage «our relations with Germany and Italy».
The USA became increasingly important for investment by banks. Of Credit
Suisse’s total assets held abroad in 1940, 208.5 million francs or 66% were in
the United States, while the corresponding figure for the Swiss Bank Corporation
was 348.2 million francs (55%), and for the Union Bank of Switzerland,
61.6 million francs (54%). In comparison, assets held in Germany, which in
view of the radical foreign exchange restrictions was becoming an increasingly
problematic area for investment, comprised only 2%, 6% and 4% respectively. 26
Thus by transferring funds to the USA, the Swiss banks were acting in the
interests of a broad range of customers who first and foremost sought financial,
but also political security. They included both Nazi victims and party members,
as well as tax evaders and people who wanted to get their capital out of Germany.
During the war, the banks did not reveal the identity of such customers to the
US authorities.
There is no doubt that connections with Germany played a role in the expansion
of the dealings of the major banks with the USA. In January 1941, the
Reichsbank asked the Union Bank of Switzerland whether it wanted to take
over the dollar transactions for which it used middlemen. In its answer, the UBS
remained true to its strategy of outsourcing questionable transactions and
suggested using a third company, Lombardbank AG in Zurich, whose staff had
been «Aryanised» with a view to such dealings. Although UBS offered the
mandate at a highly attractive commission of only 0.5‰ 27 Reichsbank finally
rejected the offer and instead expanded its relations with the Swiss Bank Corporation.
In March 1941, the Zurich branch of the Swiss Bank Corporation
became the Reichsbank’s official clearing office for its dollar transactions in
Switzerland. In its transactions in the USA, the Swiss Bank Corporation had to
conceal the involvement of the Reichsbank; it made a transfer of 294,000 dollars
from several accounts at the Chase National Bank in New York to a Mexican
bank in favour of the Banco Germánico de la América del Sur, a subsidiary of
Dresden Bank. In June 1941, the Reichsbank’s account with the Swiss Bank
Corporation showed a balance of 721,565 dollars (= 3,102,729 francs). In
summer 1944, the Swiss Bank Corporation estimated that it managed assets in
the USA to the value of 821,000 dollars for Germans and German companies,
and a further 120,000 dollars for non-German companies that were controlled
271