After harrowing probes in the 1990s, Swiss banks thought they’d come to terms with their WWII-era ties to Nazis. But WSJ’s Margot Patrick explains how documents newly unearthed from bank archives include shocking revelations. Further Reading: -Nazi Ties to Credit Suisse Ran Deeper Than Was Known, Hidden Files Reveal Further Listening: -What Just Happened at Credit Suisse? -The Financial Legacy of the Nuclear Tests on Bikini Atoll Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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In 1998, two Swiss banks, UBS and Credit Suisse, came to an agreement to settle claims that had their roots in World War II and the bank's historic ties to Nazis.
That we've reached an historic agreement. with the Swiss banks that will bring moral and material justice to those who have suffered for so long and bring closure on these issues.
The banks agreed to pay over $1 billion to descendants of Jewish account holders. It seemed like this was the end of a decades-long fight for accountability. Here's our colleague, Margot Patrick, who covers Swiss banking.
So at that point in time, I think a lot of the parties involved felt like this is it. A line has been drawn. We're going to move past this. And certainly that was how the Swiss banks felt. And that agreement in 1998 was also endorsed by more than a dozen Jewish organizations. So it really was like everyone who had been sort of around the table on this had agreed, okay, let's do this settlement.
And this will kind of put an end to it once and for all. But of course, not everyone felt that way.
But that settlement didn't turn out to be the end. Last month, a new probe into Credit Suisse surfaced some shocking revelations about the bank's ties to Nazis.
There was a Swiss lawyer who was known for cloaking Nazi transactions, and that person had several accounts at Credit Suisse. There was a relationship with a German manufacturer that used slave labor from concentration camps, and that manufacturer opened an account at Credit Suisse during the war. There were entities run by the SS that were opening accounts during the war.
These new findings are raising doubts about the bank's transparency.
And so there's this feeling that this period of time hasn't been fully studied, that there hasn't been a full sense of accountability. And so I think people want to get more transparency. There's still a sense amongst many families, many Jewish organizations, many people,
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