A senior member of the executive board of UBS was charged with tax evasion yesterday as an investigation continued in the United States into allegations that the Swiss bank helped clients to avoid taxes.

Raoul Weil, 48, chairman and chief executive of global wealth management at UBS, was indicted on a charge of conspiring to defraud the US through income tax evasion. UBS said last night that he would step down.

Mr Weil, who oversaw UBS’s cross-border private banking business, the unit at the centre of the continuing investigation, between 2002 and 2007, sits on the bank’s group executive board, the most senior management level below its main board of directors.

He is alleged to have helped 20,000 American customers of UBS to hide $20 billion (£13.3 billion) of assets from the Internal Revenue Service, according to a statement from the Department of Justice, which brought the charge.

If convicted, Mr Weil, a Swiss citizen, faces a maximum of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

UBS said: “Mr Weil has determined that, in the interest of the firm and its clients, and in order to defend himself, he will relinquish his duties at this time pending the resolution of this matter.”

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