A French judge on Thursday placed UBS AG, the Swiss parent company, under formal investigation on suspicion that it illegally sold banking services to French citizens that helped them to set up secret accounts abroad. http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/ubs-under-investigation-for-tax-evasion-in-france/?ref=world The Swiss bank also was identified as an ‘‘assisted witness,’’ a less serious status, in a concurrent investigation of suspected money laundering and tax evasion. The expanded inquiry comes just a week after the bank’s local subsidiary, UBS France, was put under formal investigation on similar suspicions. The investigators are examining the question of whether bankers from the Swiss parent company broke a French law against “illicit solicitation” by actively approaching potential French clients. UBS bankers regularly sought to ingratiate themselves into networks of affluent people, mingling at sporting events and concerts in order to seek out possible clients for tax evasion.At least 353 French citizens suspected of evading taxes through UBS have been identified, and the French government has sought administrative assistance from the Swiss government in four cases. There is a broad push in the United States and Europe to stop offshore banks from aiding tax cheats. Switzerland – where the secrecy laws punish banks for revealing client data –has been in an uncomfortable spotlight. UBS itself has been under international scrutiny since 2008, when the United States Justice Department threatened to indict it for conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service. In 2009, UBS eventually agreed to pay a $780 million fine to avoid prosecution, and turned over data on 4,450 client accounts held by United States citizens suspected of evading taxes.