This is the result of US policy and national origin discrimination is a US federal crime. Unfortunately, the US government believes that it is a great honor to be criminal against its citizens living outside of US jurisdiction. The massive fines that US expats are being threatened with are much greater than the threats Eritrea gets internationally condemned for. The only reason why the US government gets away with human rights violations, is because it has the military and economic might to do so.
Call US "representation" and demand that they resign. The US government is a disgrace. Of course, US representation won't do jack because Americans living overseas have no representation. You must either suck it up and enjoy the abuse or to liberate yourself from crime by renouncing US citizenship.
My observation: increasingly difficult as US citizen to open much less keep the your UBS / CS / Kantonalbank accounts. Expect to sign releases and disclaimers (in case of Kantonalbank, I recently had to give copy of my US declaration of foreign accounts IRS tax form...) Also, couple years ago (with UBS) my local long-term ZH-area client advisor told me he couldn't work any longer with me as all US citizen accounts were being centralised in Zürich. To my best knowledge UBS still takes US clients. For general accounts, call UBS office on Bahnhofstr. 45 in Zürich, ask for a client advisor in the "US Customers Group." For investment accounts at UBS, call UBS Swiss Financial Advisors AG at the UBS office on Löwenstr. 49 in Zürich.
A C permit should be sufficient. The only difference is that one won't be able to vote in Swiss elections and might have problems when going on a vacation beyond the EU. But, there is plenty in Europe for the stateless to entertain themselves with for a lifetime.
Yes, it is, but obviously makes life difficult without having a citizenship.
SwissPinoy I can think of a couple of problems. Opening any other bank account here other than with your current bank. Most seem to want to see your passport so I don’t know if not having one would cause problems there. And, even in Europe, you may face travel problems. I don’t think you’d be able to travel to the UK on just a Swiss C permit and no passport even though it’s part of the EU. After all they have no way of knowing you’re an EU citizen if you have no citizenship at all so theoretically Free Movement wouldn’t necessarily apply. I’m not sure I’d want to try and enter on just a Swiss permit and nothing else.
Both UBS and CS are still taking American clients and spending (presumably) millions in order to be FATCA compliant. That means the processes are in place or will be in place to handle new relationships with American account holders / beneficiaries. Thus the people denying you the relationship are just being lazy because they likely don't want to do the additional paperwork. Go to a large branch in your region and push for the account. You'll need to provide a W9 so perhaps bringing one with you, already filled out, will help. (This is one of the major forms legally required by the IRS to keep the bank compliant with FATCA.)