UBS Won’t Release Nazi Accounts Settlement Files Sought by Investigator After Court Setback
(Bloomberg) — UBS Group AG said it will not hand over a trove of privileged documents to an investigation into Credit Suisse’s handling of Nazi-linked accounts after failing to get assurances that it would not expose it to new financial allegations.
UBS said Thursday that it weighed in handing over the files to Neil Barofsky, who is overseeing the investigation into Credit Suisse archives. But he changed his mind after a New York judge said he could not shield him from future lawsuits.
Switzerland’s largest bank said Tuesday’s court ruling meant UBS could no longer risk handing over documents to it. UBS bought its troubled former rival in 2023 and inherited a number of legal cases from Credit Suisse, including this case.
“We explored ways to provide Barofsky with access to these documents while taking appropriate precautions given the recent threats of litigation related to the 1999 Settlement Agreement,” UBS said in a Q&A update on its website Thursday. “In light of the court’s decision, we will continue to maintain the confidentiality of privileged documents from the 1990s class action.”
This week’s developments risk the case moving out of the courts and back into the public and political arena. Members of a US Senate committee battered two senior UBS executives for refusing to hand over documents at a public hearing in February. Sen. Chuck Grassley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he may hold another hearing on the issue this fall.
The latest in legal wrangling came in March after UBS lawyer David Burns asked Judge Edward Korman for a declaration to prevent the Simon Wiesenthal Center from suing for more money and encouraging “any public discussion” inconsistent with the 1999 agreement. Any new allegations regarding Nazi-linked accounts could expose the bank to potential liability worth billions of dollars.
SWC, named after famed Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal, denies threatening to sue the bank.
Judge Korman ruled Tuesday that he could not issue an advisory opinion because he had no actual litigation before him in the long-running dispute between Credit Suisse and SWC.
“UBS wants to use its dispute with SWC to assert that there is a lawsuit or dispute, without actually filing any motion or lawsuit,” wrote Judge Korman, who oversaw the 1999 settlement in which Swiss banks agreed to pay $1.25 billion to Holocaust survivors and their families. “UBS can’t have it both ways.”
Barofsky said at the February hearing that the withheld records, numbering about 150, went “to the heart of our investigation” and would not be complete until he reviewed them. To further increase the pressure, Barofsky released a 73-page update on his investigation; This update revealed hundreds more potential leads to Nazi-linked accounts, including accounts of high-ranking officials and organizations.
“The investigation uncovered several instances in which Credit Suisse failed to share findings from its historical review of the Holocaust and World War II in the 1990s with public commissions that reported on Credit Suisse’s activities or its own publications,” Barofsky wrote.
But UBS remains determined. He emphasizes that the language of the 1990s agreement expressly shielded him from any potential liability, known or unknown at the time.
In Thursday’s update, the Zurich-based bank added: “We do not retain documents from before the 1990s, even if they were included in the 1990s class action files.”
He reiterated that the bank gave Barofsky access to approximately 16.5 million documents and withheld less than 0.1% of the total number, adding: “For example, if documents from the World War II period were attached to a privileged document, we do not retain these historical documents.”
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