Following the dismissal of its CEO and several key employees, Switzerland's financial regulatory authority is taking a closer look at Basel's Bank CIC.

At Bank CIC, the irregularities are piling up, with the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (Finma) now taking a closer look at the Basel-based Swiss subsidiary of the French banking group Crédit Mutuel.

Finma confirmed to the Basel newspaper «bz» (in German, behind paywall) it was informed of «inappropriate business behavior at a branch.» The authority is in contact with the bank and was aware of the changes in the bank's management. If Finma concludes that crimes may have been committed, it will file criminal charges. The Basel prosecutor's office did not comment on the case, while the public prosecutor's office in St. Gallen stated only that no charges had yet been filed in the case.

St. Gallen Branch

Rumors have been circulating at CIC since the owners took action. In December, CEO Thomas Mueller was dismissed, as «Inside Paradeplatz» first reported. In the meantime, other high-ranking employees have been shown the door.

The departures were said to have been triggered by irregularities at the St. Gallen branch, which opened in 2017. A client is said to have been granted loans in the tens of millions for real estate projects, some of which were financed in full by CIC. In return, cash and other benefits are said to have been exchanged. The client runs his own construction business and invests in income-producing real estate, according to the «bz» story.

Stumbling Onto Irregularities

According to the report, the questionable transactions were discovered when the head of the St. Gallen branch is said to have stumbled over them, as did the former regional head of German-speaking Switzerland. According to the «Handelszeitung», the heads of the banks of compliance and the change & innovation management department were also recently dismissed.

In recent years, CIC had pursued a decidedly aggressive course in its lending business and strongly pushed its corporate client business. In doing so, the now deposed CEO Mueller relied on several senior executives whom he knew from their time together at Migros Bank and brought to CIC.