President of his National Bank Saudi Arabia (National Bank of Saudi Arabia – SNB), its largest shareholder Credit Suisse before its takeover earlier this month, he stepped down, SNB said in a statement released to the Riyadh Stock Exchange.

According to the statement, the SNB board “accepted the resignation” of Amar al-Khudayri “for personal reasons.”

On March 15, Hudayri’s comments that the SNB was not going to increase its stake (9.8%) in Credit Suisse for regulatory reasons led to a fall in the Swiss bank’s shares on the stock market.

The share price rose a day after the Swiss central bank announced a $54bn (€50.2bn) bailout, but it was not enough to reassure investors amid wider concerns over the banking sector.

On March 19, Credit Suisse was acquired for a very small price by the largest Swiss banking group UBS.

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Saudi Arabia’s national bank’s $1.5 billion investment in Credit Suisse was made at the behest of Saudi Crown Prince and de facto head of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman.

According to the newspaper, Saudi Arabia’s Sovereign Wealth Fund officials at the time assessed the venture as “very risky (…) raising legal issues and the potential for significant future losses.”

On March 16, in an interview with the CNBC network, Khudayri said: “Panic (…), it is completely unjustified, whether it is Credit Suisse or the entire market.”

In an interview he gave to AFP the same day, Saudi Finance Minister Mohammed al-Jadaan, for his part, assessed that the reaction of the markets “maybe a little exaggerated.”

Without talking about specific financial institutions, the Saudi minister calculated that “many shortcomings”, mainly in “supervision, management, centralization, asset-liability mismatch” exacerbated the problems in the banking sector.

But these shortcomings do not apply to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, he added.

Khudari was replaced at the helm of the board of SNB by Saeed Mohammed al-Ghamdi, who was previously the group’s CEO.

Talal Ahmed al-Kheraiji was appointed to replace the latter as interim director.

Yesterday, Sunday, the Swiss Capital Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) announced that it is considering holding Credit Suisse executives accountable following the bank’s collapse.

“We are not a crime boss, but we are exploring the possibilities,” Marlene Amstad, president of the crime boss, said in an interview published in the Sunday newspaper NZZ am Sonntag.

^{Source: APE-MEB, AFP.}