An extensive review of Raiffeisen under former CEO Pierin Vincenz is proving a feast for lawyer, auditors and consultants. The cost reportedly threatens to eclipse the estimated financial damage.

St. Gallen-based Raiffeisen has pulled out all the stops in its review of Pierin Vincenz's 16-year reign. The former CEO has been held in custody for the past two months amid a criminal investigation which has cost Raiffeisen's chairman his job and imperils that of current CEO and Vincenz protege Patrik Gisel. 

Earlier this month, Raiffeisen enlisted the help of Bruno Gehrig, a respected Swiss economist and ex-central banker as well as securities law firm to examine the deals outside of the criminal investigation.

The bank intends to sift through all stakes that Raiffeisen took since 2005 as part of a «seamless» examination which Swiss magazine «Bilanz» (in German) estimates could cost more than 10 million Swiss francs ($10.1 million) – after the bank has already spent millions on investigations:

  • Raiffeisen boss Gisel reportedly spent 2 million francs in 2016 on an eight-month probe by law firm Prager Dreifuss into Investnet, one of the stakes that prosecutors have homed in on. The investigation formed the basis for Raiffeisen's criminal complaint against Raiffeisen.  
  • Last May, Swiss regulator Finma mandated consulting firm Deloitte with what ultimately turned into a six-month investigation into Raiffeisen's governance practices – a 2.5 million undertaking, at Raiffeisen's expense. Finma's was forced to drop a fitness and probity investigation of Vincenz when the banker dropped out of the industry, but an enforcement probe against Raiffeisen is ongoing. 
  • Vincenz himself mandated no less than three legal reviews into the propriety of Raiffeisen's acquisition of a chunk of payments firm Aduno while still at the bank. The costs for the Niederer Kraft & Frey investigation led by Peter Forstmoser, an elder statesman Swiss lawyer and former chairman of Swiss Re, are unknown. 

The magazine summarizes that the costs for Raiffeisen to clean up with Vincenz's tenure have now outstripped the suspected damage, which Bilanz estimates at 6 million francs.