Former Mirabaud partner convicted of bribery

Money in return for orders: A former partner in the Swiss private bank Mirabaud and former head of the Bankers Association has been convicted of bribery and money laundering. The Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona imposed a conditional prison sentence of two years on Pierre Mirabaud.

According to the indictment, the federal prosecutor's office accused the 77-year-old of having paid a total of 82.3 million francs to a Kuwaiti government official between 2000 and 2012. In return, the Geneva bank received orders worth hundreds of millions of francs. The abbreviated procedure in Bellinzona only lasted half a day.

In Switzerland, corruption and money laundering are punishable by a fine or a prison sentence of up to five years. However, the public prosecutor only demanded a prison sentence of 24 months. She based this on his age, his lack of criminal record and his cooperation with investigators. "He now accepts the consequences of his actions, entirely in accordance with the principles of personal responsibility that he upholds," said Mirabaud's lawyer Saverio Lembo.

Mirabaud was President of the Swiss Bankers Association from 2003 to 2009. He retired from the bank in 2009 and worked as a consultant until 2012. Bank Mirabaud, which is not a party to the proceedings, declined to comment. The now deceased Kuwaiti official was convicted in absentia in Kuwait of corruption and embezzlement of public funds.

Bank Mirabaud, founded in Geneva in 1819, is one of the oldest private banks in Switzerland. In 2024, the financial market supervisory authority Finma confiscated illegal profits of 12.7 million francs from the institute due to violations of the Money Laundering Act. The Finma investigation concerned business relationships that at times accounted for almost ten percent of the bank's assets under management.