Swiss banks are going to close the accounts of Russians, RBC reports , citing two Swiss lawyers and a source in the country's banking sector.
Roman Kudinov, managing partner of the Swiss law firm LEOLEX, told the publication that UBS and Credit Suisse informally informed his clients about this about a month ago. The warnings concern the owners of Russian companies paying taxes to the Russian budget. In order to avoid having their accounts closed, they are being asked to get rid of these companies and stop tax deductions in Russia.
The banks explained their demand by the fact that these taxes are used to finance the budget of the country, which is destabilizing the situation in Ukraine. Kudinov suggests that the Swiss authorities began to put pressure on the banking sector as part of tightening control over the implementation of sanctions against Russia.
As a source in the Swiss banking sector confirmed to RBC, UBS could indeed send such a notification to its Russian clients.
According to the Swiss Banking Association, the country has assets of Russians in the amount of 150 to 200 billion Swiss francs. As of November 2022, Switzerland has frozen Russian assets worth 7.5 billion francs. Recently, the G7 countries and the United States in particular have been demanding that the country more actively freeze funds in the accounts of Russian oligarchs.