UK FCA bans third ex-Credit Suisse banker over ‘tuna bonds’ scandal

Stay informed with free updates

Simply sign up to the Financial services myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.

A former Credit Suisse banker who was paid $200,000 by a senior colleague using money from bribes has been banned from UK financial services, in the latest fallout from Mozambique’s $2bn “tuna bonds” scandal.

The Financial Conduct Authority said Detelina Subeva told officials she did not know the money was tainted by corruption when it was paid to her by the colleague, named by US prosecutors as Andrew Pearse, with whom she was “in an intimate relationship”.

But the FCA said it decided to ban her from any regulated financial services roles because she kept the money, despite being told soon after receiving it that it had come from bribes. She was forced to forfeit the funds in 2022 after her arrest in the US three years earlier.

“Ms Subeva admitted to receiving and retaining $200,000 in illegal kickbacks,” said Steve Smart, joint executive director of enforcement and market oversight at the FCA. “There is no place in our markets for criminal behaviour.”

Subeva was one of three former Credit Suisse bankers indicted in the US over their role in one of Africa’s biggest corruption scandals. The UK regulator said in March that it had banned Pearse, a 55-year-old New Zealander, and Surjan Singh, another former Credit Suisse managing director, after they pleaded guilty in the US six years ago to accepting at least $52mn in bribes linked to loans they arranged for Mozambique.

Subeva, a 43-year-old Bulgarian, also pleaded guilty in a New York court to conspiracy to commit money laundering in 2019. US prosecutors said Pearse had shared some of the bribes he received with her. She was subsequently sentenced to time already served in custody after assisting authorities with prosecuting her two co-conspirators.

The FCA had to delay its announcement of Subeva’s ban because she initially challenged the regulator’s findings after being sent its warning notice. 

Subeva left her job as a vice-president at Credit Suisse shortly after receiving the tainted money in an account she opened in the United Arab Emirates in June 2013. 

The FCA said she decided to “continue to work in conjunction with her co-conspirators on arranging further financing for Mozambique, in circumstances where she must have been aware of the risk that further corrupt payments might be made”. 

The former Credit Suisse banker said it was “unfair” for the FCA to state “she might in some way be culpable for the misconduct of others” when “the funds were paid into her account without her knowledge” and she only learned of their tainted origin later, according to the regulator.

But the FCA dismissed this, saying the fact that she admitted to keeping the money after being told it came from bribes demonstrated Subeva’s “lack of an ethical compass”. She subsequently decided not to challenge the FCA decision in the Upper Tribunal.

The tuna bonds case stems from a $2bn deal in 2013 for Mozambique, one of the world’s poorest countries, to borrow from international investors ostensibly to fund maritime projects, including a state tuna fishery, ahead of investments in offshore gas.

Auditors later found that $500mn of the money raised by the loans could not be accounted for and that the companies behind the debt paid over the odds for equipment.

In 2021, the FCA fined Credit Suisse £147mn for serious financial crime due to diligence failings over the Mozambique bonds, when it also secured an agreement by the bank to forgive $200mn of the outstanding debt.

Controversy over the Mozambique bonds was one of several high-profile scandals that besmirched Credit Suisse’s reputation, revealing weak risk management and contributing to a loss of confidence that ultimately led to the bank’s takeover by rival UBS. 

Subeva could not be reached for comment. UBS declined to comment.