Switzerland is doubling down on its status as a rich-friendly haven after rejecting a tax on the ultrawealthy. Despite competition from other countries, one banking executive says it will remain at the top of millionaires’ lists of destinations to migrate to.
“In our business wealth management and private banking Switzerland will remain the No. 1 location worldwide,” said EFG International AG’s chief executive officer Giorgio Pradelli in a Bloomberg TV interview on Friday.
The bank bosses’ thoughts came before 78% of voters in the alpine nation undeniably rejected a proposal to impose a new national tax on inheritances or gifts of more than 50 million francs ($62 million U.S. dollars).
With that money, those revenues were planned to fund the impact of climate change and combat wealth inequality. The tax would affect about 2,500 people in Switzerland, a small fraction of its population of about 9 million people.
But that tiny faction of people holds a lot of leverage. The top 300 wealthiest residents are worth a combined 850 Swiss francs (or just over $1 trillion). In a report that measured millionaires per capita, Switzerland led globally with about 145 millionaires per 1,000 adults—meaning roughly one in seven Swiss adults is a millionaire. And Pradelli doesn’t see its status as home to the wealthy changing anytime soon.
