HSBC whistleblower Falciani fails to appear at Swiss trial

ZURICH (Reuters) - Herve Falciani, a former employee of HSBC's (HSBA.L) Swiss private bank who leaked information on clients and their tax situation, failed to appear at his Swiss trial on Monday, forcing it to be rescheduled.

Falciani, who is based in France, is accused in Switzerland of unauthorised acquisition of data, financial espionage and violating Swiss bank and business secrecy rules.

"It was simply postponed because he was not present," a spokeswoman for the Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona said, adding that the trial would resume on Nov. 2.

She declined to say whether Falciani would now be tried in absentia next month, as legal experts have suggested. "We will see if he comes or not. We don't know," she said.

HSBC's Swiss unit has been in the spotlight since 2008, when Falciani, a former IT employee at HSBC, fled Geneva with files that were leaked to the media and are alleged to show evidence of tax evasion by clients. The French daily Le Monde has said it identified more than 106,000 clients.

Authorities in France, Austria, Belgium and Argentina have also said they are investigating.

Falciani, 43, has said he is a whistleblower trying to help governments track down citizens who used Swiss accounts to evade tax. Swiss prosecutors say he is a thief who betrayed his employer.

Geneva's public prosecutor searched HSBC's lakeside Swiss office in February after opening a criminal inquiry into allegations of aggravated money laundering.

The media leaks on HSBC accounts held in Switzerland unleashed a public storm around the British bank. HSBC has apologised to customers and investors over the previous failings of its Swiss business and said it has overhauled the operation.

Falciani told a Spanish paper in May the revelations so far were "only the tip of the iceberg", and that tax authorities had access to a lot more data.

(Reporting by Michael Shields)