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...]
Financial Regulation
Getting a Grip on Global Financial Infrastructure
The United States has long relied on informal agreements with private sector institutions to assert its interests in the global financial system. If we are to fight kleptocracy, we need to make this privately run plumbing more accountable to international institutions, argues Edoardo Saravalle in … [Read more...]
Regulating complex ownership chains – a call for experts for closed brainstorming round-table session
Regulating complex ownership chains – A common goal for tackling beneficial ownership transparency and tax avoidance? The Tax Justice Network, together with City University London, the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT), Transparency International … [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...]
A “world fit for money laundering” must end in the post Covid-19 era
We're sharing here the details of explosive new research on "the untold history of how prominent civil servants in the UK tailored US-devised anti-money laundering policies in ways that suited the needs of Britain’s financial services industry." This new research was carried out by our 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...]
Quote of the day – accountants “not set up to look for fraud.”
Following the acrimonious collapse of a British cake business, Patisserie Valerie, a quote of the day from a top accountant: We’re not looking for fraud, we’re not looking at the future, we’re not giving a statement that the accounts are correct . . . we are looking in the past and we are not set … [Read more...]
Brexit and the future of tax havens
This week the Tax Justice Network's John Christensen spoke at this event at the European Parliament organised by the European Free Alliance of the Greens on Brexit and the future of tax havens. Here's more information on the event and you can watch the whole thing here. John spoke on the impact of … [Read more...]
How to assess the effectiveness of automatic exchange of banking information?
In December 2018 the OECD’s Global Forum published the new terms of reference to assess compliance with the OECD’s Common Reporting Standard (CRS) for automatic exchange of information. Two weeks later, the EU Commission published a report about automatic exchange of information within the EU. Both … [Read more...]
Is Germany’s finance minister the puppet of Big Finance?
Update, Feb 22, 2019: German Finance Minister Scholz blocks tax transparency. The Financial Times is carrying an article this week titled "Berlin falls in love with big banks" in which it quotes Chancellor Angela Merkel and her centre-left finance minister, Olaf Scholz, as having started a … [Read more...]
Fintech, hotbed of offshore deregulation and crime
Reuters has just published an article titled Swiss watchdog to propose looser anti-money laundering rules for fintechs. (Fintech is short for "financial + technology" and it is about bringing technology into the financial sector.) Switzerland's move is, apparently: part of a drive to boost … [Read more...]
Enough evidence on trusts – where are the State’s actions?
Our two last papers on trusts (here and here) described trusts’ involvement in grand corruption and other cases that would anger any rational person. The Paradise Papers, and recent case law, shed outrageous new light on trusts’ role in worsening inequality, shielding assets from legitimate … [Read more...]
Tax Justice video: How can we avoid another crisis? Expert panel discussion
In this video we hear fascinating presentations and discussion from an expert panel on how another global financial crisis can be avoided, ten years after the first. They focus on the UK, not only on the financial sector itself and the finance curse, but also on the role of the wider financial … [Read more...]
#10yearsafter the crash: the failure of HBOS and the lessons for reform
As part of our series of blogs #10yearsafter the crash we reproduce below details of new research in a timely new book, The Politics of Financial Risk, Audit and Regulation: A Case Study of HBOS. It's written by Professor Atul K. Shah, University of Suffolk who you can also follow here on twitter. … [Read more...]
10 Years after the Crash: building a reform agenda
In November 2008, the Queen apparently asked economists on a visit to the London School of Economics, ‘Why did no-one see it coming?’ Well, we're approaching the ten year anniversary of the financial crash which wiped out Lehman Brothers, saw the first run on a UK bank (Northern Rock) in 150 years, … [Read more...]
