The head of a global bank missed a payment relating to his divorce’s property division agreement and a court recently concluded the former husband owes $750,000 in interest for the late payment. It turns out that being the head of an international bank did not afford the former husband the argument that he misunderstood the terms of his divorce settlement.
The chief executive of Credit Suisse Group AG owes his former $750,000 in interest for being 12 days late with a $7.5 million divorce settlement payment. The center of the dispute was a section of the divorce settlement that measured interest on late payments. The justices who decided the case explained that the chief executive is financially sophisticated and understood the terms of the agreement.
The facts of the case started in June 2006 and the section at issue said that if the former husband was late with $7.5 million payment due June 2006 to his ex-wife, he would owe interest at 10 percent annually starting from when the divorce settlement was signed in June 2005. The chief executive argued that he should only owe interest for the 12 days the payment was late. When the payment was made, the former husband included $25,000 that represented interest calculated over 12 days.
The husband’s argument did not win the day and now his former wife is going one step further. She has filed a separate claim seeking 10 percent interest on each of the five years that the $250,000 was not paid. The issue will be addressed on a future court date.
Six years ago the former husband agreed to give his former wife $15.3 million in cash, a $9.6 million Greenwich, Connecticut home, accounts valued at $143,000 and a 2000 BMW car. At the time of the division of property, the husband was worth $80 million.
Source: The Associated Press, “Credit Suisse CEO owes ex $750K for late payment,” Dave Collins, 6/27/11