Credit Suisse chairman: 'I am truly sorry' for fate of failed bank

Axel Lehmann with Colm Kelleher, chairman of UBS, shaking hands.  The bank takeover by UBS bypassed Credit Suisse shareholders, who would otherwise have had a say, and all but wiped them out. Picture: Pascal Mora/Bloomberg

Credit Suisse's chairman apologised for taking the Swiss bank to the brink of bankruptcy, as he faced shareholder fury over the demise of the once proud flagship.

The hastily arranged takeover by Zurich-based UBS, for which Switzerland invoked emergency legislation, bypassed Credit Suisse shareholders, who would otherwise have had a say, and all but wiped them out.

Its final meeting of shareholders on Tuesday marked an ignominious end to the 167-year-old bank founded by Alfred Escher, a Swiss magnate affectionately dubbed King Alfred I, who helped to build the country's railways and then the bank.

Protesters gathered outside the concert venue where the meeting took place, with some erecting a capsized boat to depict the bank's demise.

Inside, chairman Axel Lehmann issued an apology, saying he had run out of time to turn the bank around, despite his belief "until the beginning of the fateful week" that it could survive.

"I am truly sorry," said Mr Lehmann. "I apologise that we were no longer able to stem the loss of trust."

After years of scandal and losses, Credit Suisse came to the brink of collapse before UBS rode to the rescue with a merger engineered and bankrolled by the Swiss authorities.  Mr Lehmann said that five board members would not stand for re-election, and added: 

Until the end, we fought hard to find a solution. But ultimately, there were only two options: deal or bankruptcy. The merger had to go through.

Shareholder advisory firm Ethos decried the "greed and incompetence of its managers" as well as pay that reached "unimaginable heights", as it prepared to challenge top executives at the meeting.

"Shareholders have lost considerable amounts of money and thousands of jobs are on the line," it said.

The meeting is the first time that Mr Lehmann and chief executive Ulrich Koerner publicly addressed shareholders since the takeover.

Unpopular choice 

Credit Suisse had been attempting to put the past behind it and restructure, before a shock triggered by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank in the US sent it into a spiral.

After a run on deposits, the Swiss government turned to UBS, which agreed to buy Credit Suisse for €3bn, a fraction of its earlier market value.

The move angered not only shareholders but many in Switzerland. A survey by political research firm gfs.bern found a majority of Swiss people did not support the deal.

"The government's use of emergency powers to push this deal through goes beyond legal and democratic norms," said Dominik Gross of the Swiss Alliance of Development Organisations.

"Swiss taxpayers too are on the hook for billions of francs of junk investments and yet the government, (regulator) Finma and the central bank have given little explanation about the state's 9 billion loss guarantee to UBS."

• Reuters