61340 Vorabseiten_e - Unabhängige Expertenkommission Schweiz

that they wanted to represent their customers’ interests in an optimal manner.
In this dispute, however, the banks had an advantage as they alone held all the
necessary information on the assets being sought which were not dormant at all,
but were securely being retained and administered. By contrast, the claimants
usually lacked information as to the location and the nature of the items
deposited. This unequal constellation allowed the banks to entrench themselves
behind banking secrecy and refuse to give out information if claimants were
unable to document their legal entitlement satisfactorily and could not provide
sufficient details. A situation was reached where even death certificates were
being demanded for people who had been killed in the camps, but in Auschwitz
such documents were not issued.
The second characteristic of unclaimed assets and dormant accounts is that the
(fictitious) safeguarding of property rights always paid off for the banks in any
event. Quite unlike the situation where the bank was the creditor and where –
as in the context of the crisis of the 1930s – vigorous efforts were made to save
endangered capital assets at home and, above all, abroad, a wait-and-see policy
paid off in cases where the banks were debtors, deposit holders or safe-deposit
box renters. Often, in the case of dormant accounts, banks would never have to
honour their promise to pay. Unclaimed safe-deposit boxes and safeguard
deposits generated income from the fees charged and – in the case of interestbearing
assets – commission earnings. The banks lost nothing if the dormancy
persisted; on the contrary, the monies entrusted to them that affected the
balance sheet continued to improve their interest balance – particularly as the
banks usually stopped paying interest on dormant accounts. The two aspects of
unclaimed assets and dormant accounts were discussed time and again by the
banks themselves. One year after the war ended, Union Bank of Switzerland put
the following on record:
«We may be sure that neither the Swiss Government nor the Swiss banks
or trust companies are in any way eager to appropriate the heirless or nondisposable
Jewish assets being administered or held in safekeeping in
Switzerland and thereby enrich themselves by virtue of conditions created
by the war. Properly speaking, any move would be welcomed if it allowed
an appropriate and humanitarian use to be found for heirless and nondisposable
assets. However, this would be subject to the condition that this
occur without any legal objections and, more importantly, not infringe
upon any property rights. The concept of guaranteed ownership is expressly
enshrined in our legal system and the problem can only be solved by fully
respecting ownership.» 74
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