Swiss regulator defends its decision to write off AT1 bonds
2023.03.23 03:46
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A pedestrian walks past a logo of Credit Suisse outside its office building in Hong Kong, China March 21, 2023. REUTERS/Lam Yik
ZURICH (Reuters) -Switzerland’s financial market regulator FINMA defended its decision to impose steep losses on Credit Suisse bond holders on Thursday, saying the decision was legally watertight.
On Sunday, Switzerland announced a multi-billion franc rescue of Credit Suisse, which will see it taken over by UBS.
As part of that deal the Swiss regulator ordered 16 billion Swiss francs ($17.49 billion) of its Additional Tier 1 debt to be written down to zero, while shareholders received some compensation.
“The AT1 instruments issued by Credit Suisse contractually provide that they will be completely written down in a ‘viability event’, in particular if extraordinary government support is granted,” FINMA said.
“As Credit Suisse received extraordinary liquidity assistance loans secured by a federal default guarantee on 19 March 2023, these contractual conditions were met for the AT1 instruments issued by the bank,” it added.
Tier 2 bonds will not be written down, FINMA said.
FINMA Director Urban Angehrn said that “a solution was found on Sunday to protect clients, the financial centre and the markets”.
($1 = 0.9148 Swiss francs)
