Swatch chief executive ticked off about NSA spying scandal …

By Edward Krudy

NEW YORK Thu Feb 6, 2014 7:23pm EST

Swatch Group Chief Executive Officer Nick Hayek Jr addresses the company's annual general meeting in Biel some 45 kilometres north of Bern May 29, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Arnd Wiegmann

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The eccentric chief executive officer of Swatch Group, one of the world's top watchmakers, was so incensed by recent allegations of mass U.S. spying that he chastised a top New York official over the matter in a letter late last year.

Nick Hayek's comments seemed odd coming in response to a letter from New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who administers the state's $161 billion pension fund.

DiNapoli had asked Hayek and nine other Olympic sponsors to take a stance against Russia's recent clampdown on gays ahead of the winter games in Sochi.

Most corporate executives balk at open political conflict. But not the cigar-chomping Hayek. He vigorously defended his Omega subsidiary's role as a politically neutral timekeeper at the Olympics. And that's not all. He also gave DiNapoli a dressing down over the spying scandal surrounding the U.S. National Security Agency.

DiNapoli released Hayek's comments this week, along with those from five other companies that responded to his request.

"As you claim you are an investor with Swatch Group you should be equally preoccupied about what has been publicized lately: the massive collection of data of the NSA worldwide including Switzerland," fumed Hayek, whose first language is not English, in a letter dated December 13.

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Swatch chief executive ticked off about NSA spying scandal ...