Credit Suisse's surveillance of Iqbal Khan is rooted in a feud with CEO Tidjane Thiam. finews.asia reports on the role the bank's chairman, Urs Rohner, played in unleashing the drama.
For Urs Rohner, the moment of truth has arrived: the Credit Suisse chairman is spearheading a «detailed inquiry» into the alleged confrontation between a private security detail and Iqbal Khan, who left the Swiss bank three months ago for UBS.
Rohner isn't impartial and uninvolved in the Khan drama, several people familiar with the events leading up to the Swiss bank's exit from Credit Suisse told finews.asia. In fact, the chairman's handling of Khan's exit sparked a vendetta of sorts against the top banker.
Urs Rohner Preferred
Khan first approached Rohner in late spring about leaving, long before he officially quit on July 1. The Credit Suisse chairman, a lawyer by training, and Khan hammered out the key points of the star banker's exit, the people said.
For his part, Khan had already agreed in principle with UBS to defect from Credit Suisse, but the scenario of moving from one Swiss wealth giant to another required utmost delicacy. Crucially, Rohner guaranteed that the star banker would be effectively free of all duties and obligations just three months after leaving.
Furious at Fait Accompli
What happened next is public record: the 43-year-old concluded the second quarter as head of the international wealth arm on Sunday, June 30. On Monday, he formally handed in his notice to Thiam – and disclosed the timing and financial arrangements of his departure, the people said.
Thiam was furious at the fait accompli. If the CEO had referred to Khan as his «star» in 2015, relations between the two had cooled perceptibly late in 2018 and early this year, as finews.asia reported.
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