Credit Suisse investors to challenge deal with UBS in court – Kommersant

A group of individual investors of the Swiss bank Credit Suisse is going to file a lawsuit with the Zurich Commercial Court – they are not satisfied with the terms of the takeover of Credit Suisse by another Swiss bank, UBS. The Swiss Association for the Protection of Investors (SASV) is going to file a lawsuit on their behalf on Monday. Writes about it Financial Times (FT) referring to a statement by SASV Secretary General Arik Reschke.

In March UBS announced about the emergency purchase of Credit Suisse for $ 2 billion. The merger was prepared by the Swiss authorities in a special regime that made it possible to bypass the usual procedure for consultation with shareholders on this issue, as well as their voting on the transaction. Investors who are suing are primarily unhappy with the amount UBS paid for Credit Suisse, pointing out that it is half the bank’s capitalization based on the stock price the day before the deal.

The class action lawsuit will be represented by more than 500 Credit Suisse shareholders, including many former employees of the bank. “Some of our plaintiffs worked at Credit Suisse for 30 years and received part of the payout in shares,” Mr. Reschke said, adding that 15 years ago, the shares were worth more than CHF80, and under the terms of the merger, about CHF0.76. The court is expected to make a decision on the case before the end of the year. According to Mr. Reschke, it may be beneficial for UBS to settle the case out of court – in this case, he will have to pay only the plaintiffs. If the court decides in favor of the plaintiffs, UBS may be required to pay all shareholders, which will cost billions of dollars.

Yana Rozhdestvenskaya