When Credit Suisse’s board met to approve the bank’s forced sale to UBS in March, paintings of every bank chairman since 1856 lined the boardroom.

A lawyer from Zurich, Urs Rohner, was the last to get a portrait. Chairman between 2011 and 2021, he wasn’t there in person that day. But his tenure loomed over the proceedings. He had helped turn one of Switzerland’s most solid institutions into a tinderbox.