Economic crime in 2009

The Swiss courts dealt with fewer serious economic crimes in 2009 than in 2008, but these involved larger sums of money.
 

The KPMG Fraud Barometer, which only takes into consideration financial crimes that cause damage of more than 50,000 Swiss francs, whether these are already tried or pending trial before a Swiss criminal court and reported in the press, reports 57 cases in 2009, accounting for a total of CHF 1.57 billion, versus 74 cases accounting for a sum total of CHF 1.02 billion in 2008. (1)
 

The rise in the amount of damage caused is primarily due to organised crime; one case alone (the one involving the cigarettes and money laundering mafia) accounted for CHF 1.1 billion.
 

In the lake Geneva region, there were 2 cases in 2009 which caused 117.3 million francs of damage, versus 13 cases in 2008 which caused 72.5 million francs of damage.
 

KPMG highlights two factors to explain this state of affairs. Firstly, “the financial crisis considerably aggravated the pressure exerted upon companies and their personnel. This caused growing dissatisfaction among employees, some of whom resorted to criminal methods to derive personal benefits.” (2)
 

Secondly, the figures were apparently partly caused by an increase in the internal audit measures deployed in companies. According to Mr. Hammer, “greater attention to due process and internal checks […] within companies, has brought to light cases that had remained hidden until now.” (3)
 

Company managers constituted the main group of culprits (14 cases out of 57), and caused the major part of the financial damage, namely 1.4 billion francs (versus 740 million in 2008).

These people have high levels of responsibility and skills, and they are able to organise themselves in such a way as to avoid any checks that are put in their way, or to commission tailor-made checks that will not hinder their behaviour.
 

Clients (5 cases), career criminals (13 out of 57 cases) and employees (6 cases) were also very active, but they tended to generate crimes that had a lower impact.


The moneys that are acquired fraudulently tend to be used for expenses such as the purchase or construction of real-estate properties, trips to casinos, or drugs and prostitution.
 

The implementation of control mechanisms at all levels is of vital importance, just like the maintenance of strict standards of ethics and integrity.
 

As for the victims, the most seriously affected groups remain private investors (19 cases), financial establishments (13 cases) and the authorities (7 cases).
 

 

(1) Andreas Hammer, “Investisseurs et instituts financiers: cibles favorites des fraudeurs” (Investors and financial establishments: favourite targets of fraudsters), www.kpmg.com, 02.02.2010
(2) Ibid.
(3) Ibid.