UBS settles lawsuit with finance blog

UBS settled a lawsuit brought by Credit Suisse against a popular Zurich finance blog over claims of unvetted and abusive reader comments under stories, reports Owen Walker of the Financial Times.

Walker reports, “As part of the agreement with Inside Paradeplatz, the blog, which mixes scurrilous gossip and contentious commentary with insider tip-offs, has deleted numerous reader comments and adjusted three posts, while agreeing to monitor comments in advance of publication.

“Credit Suisse brought the case against Inside Paradeplatz, a website widely read among the Swiss finance industry, and its publisher Lukas Hässig in December. UBS dropped all its claims as part of the deal, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

“In a statement, Inside Paradeplatz said it ‘commits to carefully review reader comments in advance and not to allow any infringements of personality rights regarding the plaintiffs’, adding that it ‘expresses its regret for any harm caused by the publication of reader comments’.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.