This new paper describes why beneficial ownership regulations shouldn’t exempt companies listed on a stock exchange. In essence, securities’ disclosure regulations aren’t enough to identify beneficial owners. In addition, definitions are subject to loopholes that affect identifying all relevant … [Read more...]
Policy
From outrage to action: how to prevent another 11 years of inaction after the FinCen files
The FinCen files leak disclosed information on “suspicious transaction reports” filed by banks between 2000 and 2017 to the US Financial Intelligence Unit (“FinCen”) in charge of monitoring anti-money laundering. Although a lot could be said about this leak, there are many outrageous highlights: … [Read more...]
Dubious arguments to defend secrecy, even as automatic information exchange booms
Updated: an earlier version of this blog incorrectly referred to the legal opinion of the Advocate General as belonging to Luxembourg rather than to the European Court of Justice. For years, we have advocated the automatic exchange of bank account information across borders. The previous “on … [Read more...]
Germany’s new statistics on exchange of banking information: a trove of useful data and clues
For some years now, countries have been sharing information about bank accounts held by each others’ residents, implementing “automatic exchange of bank account information” under the OECD’s Common Reporting Standard (CRS). (This is what we called for many years ago, and were scorned at the time for … [Read more...]
Developing countries, take note: how much money do your residents hold in Australia, the most transparent country on bank account information
Australia has become the first country to publish statistics on automatic exchange of information for all jurisdictions, especially those that cannot join the automatic exchange system. Here’s what they reveal and why it has more potential than statistics published by the Bank for International … [Read more...]
Tax Justice Network’s offshore wealth estimates have just been validated by the OECD
As we announced last week, the OECD has published data showing that financial accounts holding more than ten trillion euros are now the subject of multilateral, automatic information exchange - a longstanding tax justice goal that the OECD had long resisted. Now James Henry - a senior adviser to Tax … [Read more...]
It’s got to be automatic: Trillions of dollars offshore revealed by Tax Justice Network policy success
This is a moment, in these strange times, to celebrate an ongoing success in the history of the tax justice movement. Automatic, multilateral exchange of information on financial accounts is the A of our ABC of tax transparency. It has been a campaign aim since our inception in the early 2000s, as … [Read more...]
Financial Secrecy Index: who are the world’s worst offenders? The Tax Justice Network podcast special, February 2020
In this special extended Taxcast, Naomi Fowler takes you on a whistle-stop guided tour on an express train around the world with some of the Tax Justice Network team, looking at the worst offenders selling secrecy services according to the latest Financial Secrecy Index results What can nations can … [Read more...]
Unitary taxation for multinational companies: what it is and why it matters
We blogged recently that the UK's main opposition party has committed to introducing unitary taxation by the end of the next parliamentary term. As we've said, it represents an important further normalisation of unitary taxation, and a potentially important step to ending the great damage done by … [Read more...]
Paradigm shifts on tax, and who are ‘the uncounted’? Tax Justice Network November 2019 podcast
This month on the Taxcast we speak to Tax Justice Network CEO Alex Cobham about his new book The Uncounted on the politics of counting. Who's missing from the stats, from the bottom to the very top? And how can we count better? Plus: For decades corporate tax cuts have been touted as the way to … [Read more...]
Taxing multinationals: a new approach
Our headline is also the title of an important new report by Public Services International, a global trade union federation, looking at the fast-changing international tax system. Co-authored by Public Services International's Daniel Bertossa and Sol Picciotto, a Tax Justice Network Senior … [Read more...]
Taxing wealth – how to triumph over injustice: Tax Justice Network October 2019 podcast
In this month's episode we speak to Gabriel Zucman about his new book with co-author Emmanuel Saez - The Triumph of Injustice: How the Rich Dodge Taxes and How to Make Them Pay. Plus, as Extinction Rebellion holds protests around the world over the climate emergency, we point the finger at the … [Read more...]
Geopolitics trumps EU tax haven blacklist
We have blogged many times about the EU and the OECD's blacklisting process. The deadline for the US to comply with the EU list transparency criteria expired on 30 June 2019. Nothing has happened so far. We're publishing here an update guest blog written by Stefan Herweg, writing in his personal … [Read more...]
We asked our stakeholders to challenge us on our work
Should we at the Tax Justice Network be doing more to engage with organisations in the global south? Should we be focusing more on high-level advocacy or talking more about progressive taxes instead of tax avoidance? These questions and more were put to us at our organisational retreat this spring … [Read more...]
Transforming local economies: the Preston Model – a Taxcast special edition, May 2019
In this special extended edition of the May 2019 Taxcast we go to Preston in the North of England to see the Preston Model in action and how they're transforming their local economy and democratising wealth. Also: we discuss dark money and the European elections - the elite interests aligning … [Read more...]
