Our correspondent Andreas Frank writes:
Credit Suisse Group AG agreed to pay $196 million and admitted that it improperly solicited thousands of American clients, ending a U.S. regulatory probe while a broader criminal investigation of tax evasion still looms.  The settlement today includes almost $82.2 million in disgorgement, $64.3 million in prejudgment interest and a $50 million penalty.

The bank collected about $82.2 million in fees and amassed as many as 8,500 U.S. client accounts from at least 2002 through 2008, the SEC said in an administrative order today. The accounts held an average total of $5.6 billion in securities assets, the SEC said.

Credit Suisse has been ensnared in a wider Justice Department probe for the past three years into Americans’ use of off-shore bank accounts to avoid taxes. Eight bankers, including Credit Suisse’s former head of North America offshore banking, were charged in 2011 with conspiring to help American clients evade taxes through secret bank accounts.

“As Credit Suisse admitted as part of the settlement, its employees for many years failed to comply with these requirements, and the firm took far too long to achieve compliance,” Andrew Ceresney, director of the SEC’s enforcement division, said in the statement. “The broker-dealer and investment adviser registration provisions are core protections for investors.”

Credit Suisse admitted to the facts in the SEC order, which concluded that the bank “willfully violated” securities laws, and agreed to hire an independent consultant, according to the regulator.

Creidit Suisse has a history:
In 2012, Credit Suisse come into the spotlight when Christos Bagios a former banker at UBS AG and Credit Suisse was indicted and pled guilty supporting wealthy Americans hide millions of dollars from U.S. tax authorities.
In 2011 Credit Suisse was fined 149 million euros to settle allegations against the bank for helping German citizens to evade taxes.
In 2009 Credit Suisse was fined $536m  for money laundering and sanction violations by the DOJ.   SEC Credit Suisse Settlement