The pressure on Nordea and its CEO Christian Clausen increases. Now it is clear that the banking giant has an important role in the criminal investigation of SCA Hank Combing Prosecutor Thomas Forsberg at risk department against corruption launched at the end of last week.
Both Nordea and other business partners, who allowed themselves to be invited to hunting trips and private jets, are included in the investigation, according to knowledgeable sources. Examples of other business partners are Folksam and the former CEO Anders Sundström.
Prosecutor Thomas Forsberg is still reticent about the investigation but several sources say that it is not at all impossible that CEO Christian Clausen served on suspicion of crime at a later stage.
It is above all the fact that Nordea has a customer relationship with SCA, which is troublesome for Christian Clausen. Nordea has repeatedly been involved in arranging large loans that SCA has taken, including a so-called EMTN program of approximately SEK 30 billion and a commercial paper program of SEK 15 billion.
For the Nordea will information about the investigation as a novelty:
– We have not been contacted by the chamber prosecutor in this matter. We understand the debate and takes us by the criticism, but our view is that the president has followed the applicable regulations when he represented Nordea at SCA events, says Petter Brunnberg, Press Officer at Nordea.
The Swedish mutlagstiftningen has been tightened in recent years and the attitude towards corruption has also become more stringent. Helena Sunden, Secretary General of the Anti-Corruption Institute, has previously said that her preliminary assessment is that Christian Clausen’s hunting trips likely to violate the Institute näringslivskod.
– My assessment is that it conflicts with our code. Among other things, there is a benefit with a high market value and because it is given to a person sitting in decision-making positions. In addition, the code says that you should find useful on the job of the benefits they receive. The question is whether one has the benefit of hunting on the job, said Helena Sunden to SvD Business recently.
Financial Supervisory Authority (FI) has also announced that it has initiated a review of Nordea.
– For us it is important that banks can handle these types of situations. It is important for the control of the business work in a good way and to maintain public confidence, says Jonathan Holst, Head of the FSA and continues:
– We want to form our own opinion on the events and on the handled properly. We have a discussion with Nordea but what we say to each other, we can not comment, he said.
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