Editorial - Corporations and their tax shell games: Time for a global crackdown Los Angeles Times Israel to tax Google and Facebook on profits i24 A lower rate of corporation tax – that’s what Japanese companies will get for not paying it The Independent … [Read more...]
Secrecy
Insurance sector seeking to trick the OECD with giant secrecy loophole?
Update: with Gibraltar / Bermuda shenanigans. Last February the OECD, which has been mandated to set global financial transparency standards, presented a major report on a new global standard for transparency and to fight the scourge of tax evasion. We broadly welcomed the project, but noted … [Read more...]
How Seychelles became a paradise for dirty money and corruption
In 2012 Al Jazeera published a remarkable undercover television investigation into the Seychelles, where two African journalists posing as wealthy Zimbabweans were brazenly offered the sleaziest secrecy services. It's a classic of offshore undercover investigation, and we at TJN have referenced it … [Read more...]
The Offshore Wrapper: a week in tax justice
The Offshore Wrapper is written by George Turner The Togo triangle: where stolen Nigerian oil disappears Nigeria: the land of lost opportunity. Billions of dollars from oil revenue has literally been siphoned out of the country. The story – and corruption - has run for decades. … [Read more...]
Links Jun 6
EU to Decide Next Week on Irish, Dutch Tax-Breaks Probe Bloomberg UK fails to block proceeds of corrupt Nigerian oil deal Global Witness See also: UK leads charge in some key battles against corruption – now others must follow Global Witness … [Read more...]
The Price of Offshore Revisited – new material
We published a long rebuttal yesterday to an attack on TJN by two U.S. academics, supported by the lobbying arm of the British tax haven of Jersey, which has publicised it at a conference in London today. The attack focused quite heavily on our 2012 report The Price of Offshore Revisited, which … [Read more...]
Links Jun 5
The World's Movement Toward Tax Transparency Bloomberg BNA Even the Weak Anti-Abuse Measures Contemplated by OECD Are Too Much for Republican Tax Writers Citizens for Tax Justice See also: Republicans Join Business in Warning on Global Tax Talks Bloomberg, and addressing spin in Developing … [Read more...]
Links Jun 4
Anonymous Shell Companies Are Part of the Problem, Too: Often Used to Inject Dark Money Into Campaigns FACT Coalition New Zealand: the Shell Company Incorporation Franchises (V) (and Panama and Switzerland) naked capitalism … [Read more...]
Tax haven of Jersey to attack TJN with funded study. We respond.
June 6: updated with details of book project. Jersey Finance, the lobbying arm of the finance industry in the offshore tax haven of Jersey, tomorrow will host a media event in London attacking TJN and our estimates for the size of the offshore industry, and publicising a supposedly independent … [Read more...]
Links Jun 3
The BEPS Monitoring Group: Submission on Hybrid Mismatch Arrangements Mauritius agrees to treaty revision with India STEP See also: India and Mauritius to Begin Automatic Exchange of Tax-Related Information India Briefing … [Read more...]
In 2009-10, over 98 pct of Google’s and Oracle’s subsidiaries disappeared
. . . disappeared from view, that is. From the Social Science Research Network, an academic paper from last year: "From 2009 to 2010, 98 percent of Google’s and 99 percent of Oracle’s subsidiaries disappeared from the Exhibit 21s filed with their SEC Form 10Ks. However, a March 2012 search of … [Read more...]
Links May 29
OECD BEPS Webcast Update See the TJN briefing on BEPS here. Rather than write them off, developing countries should be included in new information exchange system Thomson Reuters India PM Modi government sets up special team to probe black money in tax havens VCCircle See also: SIT on Black … [Read more...]
On the non-perils of information exchange
Update: see TJN writer Nicholas Shaxson's Five Myths about Tax Havens, in the Washington Post, April 2016. Back in 2009 we wrote a long blog looking at tax havens' arguments that if they give up information to countries with poor governance, all sorts of disasters will ensue. We think it's … [Read more...]
Links May 23
US senators say more needs to be done after Credit Suisse conviction The Guardian See also: Credit Suisse Seen Keeping U.S. Bank License Bloomberg video - talks of the penalty being "political card playing", in that Credit Suisse are seen to be punished but they are still continuing as a bank in … [Read more...]
Links May 22
Finnwatch report on tax responsibility of Finnish Pension Fund investments Report finds that Finnish pension funds tend to ignore global tax responsibility issues related to their investment activities. (Report in Finnish, with English language executive summary) Special Report: Under pressure, … [Read more...]
