Luxembourg Police Raid EFG Bank's Local Offices in Money-Laundering Probe

Luxembourg's investigating magistrates ordered the search of the local offices of Swiss private bank EFG on 24 February 2026, in what has become the most high-profile financial-sector investigation of the year. The bank confirmed the raid and said it is fully cooperating. The probe is focused on suspected money-laundering activity and shortcomings in the institution's anti-terrorism financing controls.

What investigators are looking at

According to early disclosures, prosecutors are examining whether EFG's Luxembourg subsidiary exercised insufficient vigilance over specific client activities, whether organisational weaknesses in compliance produced systemic blind spots, and whether the bank fully met its obligation to cooperate with prior authority requests. The combination — substantive transactional concerns plus alleged process failures — is precisely the pattern Luxembourg's reformed AML framework is designed to surface.

Why this matters for the financial centre

Luxembourg has spent the past decade under sustained external scrutiny on AML. LuxLeaks in 2014, the OpenLux investigation in 2021 and a string of subsequent FATF and Moneyval reviews have all pushed the country's supervisory architecture to harden. The 2026 reform of the AML framework, which came into force earlier this year, broadened reporting obligations, strengthened beneficial-ownership verification and gave the CSSF and the Cellule de Renseignement Financier expanded powers. The EFG raid is the first major test of those new powers in action.

EFG's position

The bank, headquartered in Zurich, is one of the largest Swiss private-banking groups by assets. Its Luxembourg presence is a meaningful piece of its European wealth-management footprint. EFG's public statements have stressed cooperation, denied any systemic intent and signalled confidence that the matter will be resolved without material commercial damage. That posture is also exactly what the bank's investors need to hear; whether the actual case file supports it will become clearer as proceedings progress.

The wider Luxembourg AML moment

The EFG raid lands in the same year as the conviction of Edmond de Rothschild Europe — the first ever Luxembourg bank conviction for money laundering, in connection with the 1MDB scandal. Two cases at this scale within months of each other change the tone. Luxembourg supervisors and prosecutors are demonstrating, against years of reputational headwind, that the framework can produce binding outcomes against well-resourced banks.

What to watch

Three things. The scope of charges, if and when they are formalised. EFG's internal response, including any senior personnel changes. And the read-across to other Luxembourg subsidiaries of foreign private banks: the cohort that came under intensified CSSF scrutiny in 2024-2025 is the same cohort whose 2026 risk profile the EFG case will help define.