Angry Credit Suisse shareholders reject 2020 discharge

Credit Suisse shareholders on Friday rejected by a wide margin the board’s proposal to provide the beleaguered Swiss bank’s management a discharge from liabilities for the 2020 financial year, as investor ire over a slew of costly missteps grows.

The board’s proposal to provide managers a legal discharge for 2020 — a sign of backing, which also waives some of the directors’ liabilities for the period — garnered only 35.88 percent support at the bank’s annual general meeting, even after the board had excluded the collapse of the bank’s Greensill-linked supply chain finance funds from the discharge.

Votes at this year’s AGM covered two financial years as Credit Suisse withdrew an agenda item from its meeting in 2021 while it investigated two scandals which hit the bank in March that year. Shareholders on Friday approved the 2021 discharge.