Trafigura and Former COO Found Guilty of Bribery in Switzerland.
A Swiss court has convicted Trafigura and its former Chief Operating Officer (COO) Mike Wainwright on bribery charges, marking the first time a senior executive at a major commodity trading firm has been found guilty of corruption.
On Friday, the Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona, Switzerland, sentenced Wainwright to 32 months in prison, with 20 months of the sentence suspended. Trafigura, which faced charges via its Dutch holding company, Trafigura Beheer BV, was found guilty of lacking adequate systems to prevent bribery. The company was fined 3 million Swiss francs ($3.3 million) and ordered to pay $145.6 million in compensation to the Swiss Confederation.
This ruling represents a significant moment for Switzerland, which has been under pressure to demonstrate its commitment to regulating the commodities industry, an area that has traditionally operated with minimal oversight. Trafigura is the first major company in Swiss history to be convicted at trial for facilitating the payment of bribes.
The verdict caps a challenging period for Trafigura, one of the world’s largest traders of oil, gas, and metals. Over the past two years, the company has faced major financial losses due to alleged frauds, pleaded guilty to separate corruption charges in the United States, and settled market manipulation claims.
This case adds to growing scrutiny of the commodities trading sector, which has been plagued by corruption scandals in recent years. Several of the industry's biggest players, including Glencore Plc, Vitol Group, and Trafigura, have admitted to historical bribery in countries ranging from Brazil to South Sudan.
During a two-week trial in December, Swiss prosecutors painted Trafigura as a company where compliance was sidelined in favour of profit. They argued that the company’s senior executives dominated its compliance committee, with Wainwright sitting on the oversight board alongside Trafigura's late founder and CEO, Claude Dauphin. "The wolves were guarding the sheep," the prosecution stated.
In their defence, Trafigura's lawyers argued that the bribery charges were part of an unjust "crusade" by Swiss prosecutors. They also claimed that key witness Mariano Ferraz, a former senior executive at Trafigura, was offering his testimony in exchange for a reduced sentence in a separate Brazilian case, and sought unsuccessfully to have his evidence excluded from the trial.
The case centred on allegations that Trafigura paid over $5 million in bribes to Angolan official Paulo Gouveia Junior in exchange for lucrative oil contracts worth around $151 million. Gouveia was also found guilty of accepting the bribes.
A third individual, Thierry Plojoux, a former Trafigura employee and middleman, was convicted of conspiring with Wainwright to pay the bribes.
Before the trial, Trafigura claimed that its anti-bribery and corruption controls had been externally reviewed and found to meet the legal requirements and international standards at the time. Since 2019, the company has prohibited using middlemen to secure new business.
The court's ruling is a preliminary decision, and the case can still be appealed, first to the federal criminal appeals court and then to the Swiss Supreme Court if necessary. The judgment has not yet entered into force, meaning the three men maintain their presumption of innocence. Under Swiss law, an appeal essentially functions as a retrial of the facts, which means Wainwright is unlikely to face imprisonment anytime soon.
