(Bloomberg) -- UBS Group AG should be ordered to pay 3 billion euros ($3.6 billion) over allegations the Swiss bank helped French clients hide money from tax authorities, according to prosecutors and the government who are pushing for a smaller combined penalty on appeal.

Prosecutor Serge Roques asked the Paris court of appeals to impose a 2 billion-euro fine on UBS. The French state, which is a plaintiff in the case, is also seeking 1 billion euros in damages from the bank in addition to any court-imposed penalties.

“For facts of an exceptional magnitude, it is necessary to apply an exceptional fine,” Roques said Monday during closing arguments in the case that started earlier in March.

UBS’s 3.7 billion-euro fine and a further 800 million euros in damages in February 2019 was a European record. It was emblematic of a French crackdown on tax evasion that has focused on big banks from HSBC Holdings Plc to Credit Suisse Group AG, who investigators believed encouraged such behavior by its citizens.

Appeals in France take the form of a new trial where judges are often free to cut or raise the penalty as they see fit. The lower court judgment has been put on hold pending the appeal and UBS has only set aside 450 million euros in provisions for the eventual verdict.

A ruling in the case is expected in several months.

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