Credit Suisse's founder, Alfred Escher, was called, "the spiritual father of the railway law of 1852," for his work defeating the idea of a state-run railway system in Switzerland in favor of privatization. Escher founded Credit Suisse (originally called the Swiss Credit Institution, i.e., Schweizerische Kreditanstalt) in 1856 primarily to provide domestic funding to railway projects, avoiding French banks that wanted to exert influence over the railway system. Escher aimed to start the company with three million shares and instead sold 218 million shares in three days. The bank was modeled after Crédit Mobilier, a bank funding railway projects in France that was founded two years prior, except Credit Suisse had a more conservative lending policy focused on short-to-medium term loans. In its first year of operation, 25 percent of the bank's revenues was from the Swiss Northeastern Railway, which was being built by Escher's company, Nordostbahn. 
Today, Credit Suisse Group is a Swiss multinational financial services holding company, headquartered in Zürich, that operates the Credit Suisse Bank and other financial services investments. The company is organized as a stock corporation with four divisions: Investment Banking, Private Banking, Asset Management, and a Shared Services Group that provides marketing and support to the other three divisions. Credit Suisse was founded by Alfred Escher in 1856 under the name Schweizerische Kreditanstalt (SKA, English: Swiss Credit Institution) in order to fund the development of Switzerland's rail system. It issued loans that helped create Switzerland's electrical grid and the European rail system. It also helped develop the country's currency system and funded entrepreneurship. In the 1900s Credit Suisse began shifting to retail banking in response to the elevation of the middle-class and the growing popularity of savings accounts. Credit Suisse partnered with First Boston in 1978. After a large failed loan put First Boston under financial stress, Credit Suisse bought a controlling share of the bank in 1988. In the 1990s, Credit Suisse acquired the Winterthur Group, Swiss Volksbank, Swiss American Securities Inc. (SASI) and Bank Leu among others. In the year 2000, it added the U.S. investment firm Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette. The company restructured itself in 2002, 2004 and 2006. It was one of the least affected banks during the global financial crisis, but afterwards began shrinking its investment business, executing layoffs and cutting costs. During the period between 2008 and 2012, Germany, Brazil, and the United States began a series of investigations into the use of Credit Suisse accounts for tax evasion. In May 2014, the company pleaded guilty to decades of conspiring to help US citizens avoid taxes, and agreed to pay $2.6 billion in fines. In 2014, Credit Suisse had 888.2 USD Bn of assets under management (AuD) according to the Scorpio Partnership (an increase of 9.5% on 2013). In March 2014, Credit Suisse denied claims it had been drawn into a Swiss competition probe investigating potential collusion to manipulate foreign exchange rates by various Swiss and foreign banks. In May 2014, Credit Suisse pleaded guilty to conspiring to aid tax evasion. It was the most prominent bank to plead guilty in the United States since Drexel Burnham Lambert in 1989 and the largest to do so since the Bankers Trust in 1999. "Credit Suisse conspired to help U.S. citizens hide assets in offshore accounts in order to evade paying taxes. When a bank engages in misconduct this brazen, it should expect that the Justice Department will pursue criminal prosecution to the fullest extent possible, as has happened here," Attorney General Eric H. Holder said at the time. Holder also said "This case shows that no financial institution, no matter its size or global reach, is above the law." Credit Suisse shares rose 1% on the day the $2.6 billion penalty was announced.
On 10 March 2015, it was announced that Tidjane Thiam, the CEO of Prudential would leave to become the next CEO of Credit Suisse. In September 2016, Brian Chin was appointed Chief Executive of Global Markets and joined the executive board of the bank. At this time, it was also announced that Eric M. Varvel was appointed president and CEO of Credit Suisse Holdings (USA). Credit Suisse is more internationally minded than most European banks. According to WetFeet's Insider Guide, Credit Suisse offers more travel opportunities, greater levels of responsibility and more client interaction than new employees get at competing firms, but is known for long hours. Analysts report 60- to 110-hour work-weeks. Roles and responsibilities are less stringent and the environment is pleasant despite hours being "the most grueling on Wall Street." Vault's Insider's Guide reached similar conclusions, noting above-average training, executive access and openness matched with reports of 80- to 100-hour work-weeks.