LONDON/ZURICH, July 3 (Reuters) – U.S. investment manager
BlackRock is buying Swiss Re’s European
private equity arm, marking the second deal for a private equity
fund manager in as many days as sellers contend with a new
regulatory landscape and tough trading.

Swiss Re’s deal to sell its $7.5 billion private equity and
infrastructure fund of funds business follows hot on the heels
of HarbourVest Partners’ agreement to buy Amsterdam-listed
private equity fund of funds business Conversus Capital
.

ZURICH (Reuters) – Child labor is still widespread on Ivory Coast cocoa farms supplying Nestle (NESN.VX: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), an investigation by a workers’ rights group has found, prompting the world’s biggest food group to pledge a redoubling of efforts to stamp out the practice.

The Fair Labor Association (FLA), a Washington-based civil society organization, said its investigation was the first time a multinational chocolate producer had allowed its procurement system to be completely traced and assessed.

ZURICH, June 28 (Reuters) – The cap the Swiss National Bank
set on the franc is its best strategy for managing the economy,
its vice chairman said on Thursday, while not ruling out further
measures including possible capital controls in the event of a
deeper crisis.

As things stood and given the franc’s safe-haven appeal, the
cap of 1.20 per euro that the SNB set on the soaring local
currency last September was the right policy, Jean-Pierre
Danthine told an event in Zurich.

WASHINGTON/ZURICH, June 21 (Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury
Department said on Thursday it had reached tentative agreements
with Switzerland and Japan to help banks in those countries
comply with upcoming U.S. tax evasion regulations.

U.S. tax collectors are on track to begin penalizing foreign
banks in 2014 for failing to disclose information to government
authorities about clients who are U.S. citizens. Foreign banks
have fretted about this, with some saying they could not comply
due to domestic privacy laws.

ZURICH, June 19 (Reuters) – Julius Baer is in
talks with Bank of America about buying Merrill Lynch’s
non-U.S. wealth management unit, valued at up to $2 billion, in
what would be a transformative deal for the acquisition-hungry
Swiss private bank.

Consolidation in the wealth management industry has been a
major theme since the 2008 financial crisis, as an increase in
costs and regulation force some players to sell off units and
others – like Baer – to seek to improve margins through scale.