Credit Suisse chairman resigns for violating Covid-19 lockdown

The president of Credit Suisse, Antonio Horta-Osório resigned due to revelations that he had breached the Covid-19 quarantine rules, said the bank, which chose Axel Lehmann to succeed him.

Lehmann, who joined the board of administration in early October following an extraordinary general meeting as chairman of the risk management committee, he succeeds him with “immediate effect,” the bank said in a statement late Sunday.

To formalize his presidency, the board of directors will propose his candidacy at the next general meeting, scheduled for April 29.

Horta-Osório resigns as soon as eight and a half months after taking office.

It was chosen in the midst of the turbulence of 2021, when the bank was shaken by the bankruptcy of the British finance company Greensill and the implosion of the US fund Archegos.

Horta-Osório had promised to put risk management back at the center of the bank’s culture.

The Portuguese banker came to management with a solid reputation for turning to the British bank Lloyd´s.

But in December his term was clouded by press revelations about quarantine that he had violated during a brief stay in Switzerland.

Horta-Osório resigned after an investigation commissioned by the board of directors.

Axel Lehmann is a former senior executive of UBS, the rival bank of Credit Suisse, and also spent part of his career at Zurich Insurance, where he worked for almost 20 years.