Call for papers for a Research Workshop on CORRUPTION AND THE ROLE OF TAX HAVENS City University London, 28th / 29th April 2016 In May 2016 the U.K Government will be hosting a global summit on corruption. Ahead of this event, the Association for Accountancy & Business Affairs,(i) City … [Read more...]
Corruption
The ironic pillage of tax haven Puerto Rico by offshore hedge funds
Puerto Rico is a peculiar historical relic, whose relationship with the United States has strong echoes of the half-in-half-out relationships that the British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies enjoy with the mother country, the United Kingdom. This halfway-house link, which provides solid … [Read more...]
Venezuela’s rampant corruption
This guest blog from Alek Boyd explores what happens when oil, offshore financial secrecy and populist politics combine to corrupt the hopes of an entire nation. When the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists published leaked HSBC data provided by Hervé Falciani in February this … [Read more...]
Panama thumbs its nose at transparency – again
We have on several occasions fingered Panama as a particularly recalcitrant secrecy jurisdiction: our recent Panama Narrative Report spills a fair number of beans in that respect. Its recalcitrance is perhaps hardly surprising, given the quantity of Colombian and Mexican drugs money believed to be … [Read more...]
Lazonick: tax cheating is just part of Pfizer’s corrupt business model
Recently the U.S. pharma giant Pfizer announced a merger with the drugmaker Allergan, in a deal heavily motivated by tax cheating via a 'corporate' inversion - a corporate relocation to take advantage of (in this case Ireland's) lax tax regime. Much has been said on the topic, with U.S. … [Read more...]
Jersey: the fall of a Finance-Cursed tax haven
A new article in the Guardian Long Reads series, entitled The fall of Jersey: how a tax haven goes bust. (Not as dramatic as this one, but still.) The article heavily features Jerseyman John Christensen, TJN's Director (along with Richard Murphy of Tax Research UK, who has been influential in … [Read more...]
Workshop: Call for Papers on Corruption and the Role of Tax Havens
Call for papers for a Research Workshop on CORRUPTION AND THE ROLE OF TAX HAVENS … [Read more...]
John Christensen on rocking the boat in Jersey
In this blog, first published in the Whistleblower Edition of Tax Justice Focus (available here), TJN's director John Christensen, a former Economic Adviser to the island of Jersey, reflects on his experience of exposing a banking scandal, which involved him in a direct confrontation with senior … [Read more...]
The private banking fairy tale: a whistleblower’s story
This article was originally published in the Whistleblower Edition of Tax Justice Focus (November 2015) Whistleblowing by finance professionals has begun to make significant inroads into the sector’s culture of secrecy and collusion. Here UBS whistleblower Stéphanie Gibaud describes the costs to … [Read more...]
How the U.S.A. became a secrecy jurisdiction
This month we published our fourth Financial Secrecy Index (FSI), complete with a series of reports about each of the biggest tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions, looking into the political and economic histories of how and why they went offshore, who was involved, and where the bodies are … [Read more...]
How Ireland became an offshore financial centre
This month we published our fourth Financial Secrecy Index (FSI), complete with a series of reports about each of the biggest tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions, looking into the political and economic histories of how and why they went offshore, who was involved, and where the bodies are … [Read more...]
Christian Aid: new Swissleaks analysis shows harm to developing countries
An important new analysis from Christian Aid. Note the pull-out quote highlighting the problems with the OECD's Common Reporting Standard, or CRS. September 30 2015 NEW SWISSLEAKS ANALYSIS REVEALS HOW TAX HAVEN SECRECY HARMS DEVELOPING COUNTRIES New, detailed examination of the SwissLeaks files … [Read more...]
Switzerland: still the home of secret banking
There's been a lot of press about Swiss banking secrecy being finished, because of certain improvements that have been made. We periodically issue reminders that this ain't so, for many reasons. Just for instance: Swiss Banking Secrecy laws, in the spirit of the famous 1934 Swiss Banking Secrecy … [Read more...]
Russia’s offshore financial nexus, threatening financial stability and security
We have for years remarked on the role of the offshore system in promoting financial instability, not least for its propensity to enable financial players to get out from under financial regulations they don't like, then taking the cream from risky activities and shifting the risks onto others. … [Read more...]
Will Brazil’s “CPMF” financial transactions tax live another day?
For the decade that lasted up to 2007, Brazil levied a tax on financial transactions called the CPMF. It was a biggy: this tax raised nearly $20 billion in its last year of operation before it was killed off by a coalition of people opposed to it, some of whom are in this photo. The tax had two … [Read more...]
