Banking

Julius Baer Group

Last edited by on June 17, 2009 - 11:07pm
Company Snapshot: 

Julius Baer Group is a Swiss banking firm which is the parent company of Bank Julius Bär, a traditional private bank based in Zurich, Switzerland, which dates back to the year 1890 when it was founded by the famous banker Julius Bär. The Julius Baer Group manages substantial assets for private and institutional clients from all over the world. The Group's services consist mainly of asset management, wealth management and investment consultation, investment funds for private and institutional investors as well as securities and foreign exchange trading.

Apart from its head offices in Switzerland, the bank has offices in Frankfurt, Milan, Geneva, Dubai, Grand Cayman, New York, Singapore and Hong Kong.

In September 2005, Julius Bär acquired the independent private banks Ferrier Lullin, Ehinger & Armand von Ernst, Banco di Lugano, and the asset management house Global Asset Management from the Swiss banking giant UBS AG, to become one of the largest independent wealth management firms in Switzerland. The companies of the Group are consolidated within Julius Baer Holding Ltd., whose shares are listed on the SWX Swiss Exchange. Julius Baer’s market capitalization amounts to around CHF 4.0 billion. Due to its comprehensive service and product range, clients from around the world have entrusted Julius Baer with assets amounting more than CHF 400 billion at the end of July 2007.

Number of employees worldwide: 
3,800
Chief executive officer: 
Johannes A. de Gier
Website: 
http://www.juliusbaer.com
Tel: 
+41 (0) 58 888 1111
Fax: 
+41 (0) 58 888 5144
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Corporate accountability
Accountability overview: 

A Julius Baer fake annuity scheme costs a rock star manager $22 million

A Julius Baer operation in partnership with SwissPartners (both in Zurich and Grand Cayman) offered clients the chance to escape taxes by paying millions for annuity premiums which in fact were deposited in offshore funds that would earn clients money they could choose not to report to home tax authorities. At least one of the clients got burned.

Tony Defries, the rock manager who launched David Bowie, bought into the scheme and invested, ie paid an annuity premium of $22 million. Unfortunately for Defries, the money managers weren’t properly monitoring investments. In 2000, the bubble broke and dot.coms crashed. Defries said "sell," but his money managers failed to pull out of those stocks, and Defries lost his investment.

He filed a civil complaint in 2003 in federal court in Virginia, where he was then living in a mansion in the hunt country, charging SwissPartners, Julius Baer Bank and a collection of other defendants with “securities and insurance fraud.” The suit was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.

"Ex-Rock Impresario Tony Defries lost $22 million in offshore tax evasion scheme run through Julius Baer Bank.” By Lucy Komisar, March 3, 2008.

Human rights: 

WikiLeaks reports an incident of stalking on behalf of Julius Baer, "Stalking in Switzerland is not a crime and therefore Swiss authorities will not punish a stalker even though the Stalker creates psychological torture on a six year old child and his family. This is the case where the stalker is Julius Baer and its Management. In addition Julius Baer offers money CHF 500'000 in order to solve the problem and to silence a Swiss Banker."

WikiLeaks Conflict

Julius Baer Bank announced in January 2008 that it would file suit against the Internet-based transparency group Wikileaks for releasing several hundred documents allegedly obtained from Rudolf Elmer, the former deputy director of the company's Cayman Islands office.

The bank filed suit in the Northern District of California on February 13, 2008.

Within two weeks, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Northern California (ACLU-Northern California) had filed a motion to intervene in the case.

On February 29, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White ruled that the groups had raised many issues that were not considered at the original hearing and lifted the injunction, which he said had triggered "exactly the opposite effect" of that intended: generating mirror sites duplicating Wikileaks' content and fanning media interest that only "increased public attention to the fact that such information was readily available online."

The documents at issue purportedly show offshore tax evasion and money laundering by wealthy and in some cases, politically sensitive, BJB clients from the US, Europe, China and Peru.

BJB retained Hollywood media lawyers Lavely and Singer to represent them against Wikileaks.

Elmer brought a December 2007 anti-stalking case against BJB in an attempt to prevent BJB's private detectives following him. The Swiss daily Welt Woche, in a 2005 article called "The Leak in Paradise", confirmed the veracity of several of the files with two BJB Cayman Islands office employees.

To learn more about the story visit the Wikileaks Bank Julius Baer section.

Sources
Watchdogs and related campaigns: 
WikiLeaks' Julius Baer Page