British investment fund founder has sold his villa on Lake Geneva and is moving his family to London after 15 years in Switzerland, after a burglary in which thieves knocked down his interior wall home to remove a safe weighing more than 200 kilograms.
Speaking to Swiss newspaper Le Temps, Robert Gibbins, who is the founder of Autonomy Capital, a global macro investment firm founded in 2003 in the canton of Vaud, sadly said he was hit in the early hours of Jan. 1 this year.
The house, empty, which according to the financier was rare, was accessed when the intruders forced themselves in, knocked down a wall to reach the safe, which held valuables and family heirlooms he described as irreplaceable.
He described the burglary as unusual, saying the villa was rarely left unoccupied and that January 1 was one of the few days of the year when nobody was home.
In his words, the burglars smashed through the main gate on their way out. Gibbins declined to put a value on what was taken and said he believes the property had been watched beforehand.
“When I tell my friends in Hong Kong or New York what happened to us – a wall knocked down, a 200kg safe ripped out – they assure me they’ve never heard of anything like it,” Gibbins said. “That’s when I realise how much we’ve normalised the unthinkable here.”
Beyond founding Autonomy Capital, Gibbins has developed interests in international real estate, including property investment and development ventures in Brazil and Spain.
Brazilian corporate records identify him as a shareholder in several property companies, while he previously chaired Autonomy Spain Real Estate SOCIMI, Which dissolved in 2022.
In a net worth estimate by Blick newspaper, the robbed millionaire is currently worth about 65-70 million CHF in fortune. His two daughters were born and raised in Vaud.
Since the burglary, the family has sold the villa, taken the children out of school in Vaud and moved its professional activities to London.
This is #superhumans, the cutting edge prosthetics effort for #ukrainian servicemen in #lviv , Ukraine. This effort has a role in helping some with terrible injuries from the war .
— Robert Gibbins (@robertgibbins14) June 26, 2024
The capacity in this society towards distributed, excellent, innovative production is noticeable. pic.twitter.com/3ZC1EFPMLN
Conversations Gibbins had with neighbours after the break-in have left him with the impression that almost every household nearby had been burgled in the previous three or four years.
He has since joined a community WhatsApp group for the Coppet area where residents report prowlers and break-ins.
What shocked the financier further, he said, was the advice he received from cantonal police to install reinforced doors and bulletproof windows or hire private security.
But he said he rejects living behind high walls and floodlights as “the antithesis of the open society that makes Switzerland great.”
“By normalising these crimes on the grounds that no one was physically harmed, Switzerland risks eroding its most valuable asset,” Gibbins said .
“Switzerland is a wonderful place, but it absolutely must take action,” he added “This departure highlights the breakdown of a system.”
Gibbins’ moving to London comes with an uncomfortable contrast in the crime figures. London recorded 33,038 residential burglaries in the 12 months to June this year, equivalent to 3.6 offences per 1,000 residents.
Meanwhile, In Switzerland’s canton of Vaud, where Gibbins lived, 2,766 residential burglaries were recorded last year. Against the canton’s population of 864,200, that represents approximately 3.2 burglaries per 1,000 residents.
Although the figures cover different reporting periods, they suggest that London has a higher recorded residential burglary rate than Vaud.
The move therefore takes Gibbins and his family from an area where he lost confidence in Switzerland’s security to a city with an even higher recorded rate of residential break-ins.
Gibbins said Switzerland could lose business founders if families no longer feel secure in the country.
