Juan Martin del Potro denies he has committed tax evasion in his native Argentina. His spokesman Jorge Viale said Monday there was “no evasion” and all procedural steps were being followed to resolve the case. The newspaper Perfil reported on Sunday that Argentine tax authorities had opened a case again… – Continue reading
Burger King is moving to Canada, by way of Omaha. Warren Buffett is finally getting into the burger business. Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway brk.a -0.00% has agreed to help finance Burger King’s BKW -4.32% purchase of Canadian coffee-and-doughnut chain Tim Hortons THI 8.47% . The deal, first reported by The Wall… – Continue reading
A political candidate has sparked the Reserve Bank and the Financial Markets Authority to visit a foreign-owned company offering “secret” offshore accounts. Grace Haden, an independent standing for election in Epsom, raised concerns with the regulators about Breder Suasso, which is referred to on overseas websites as a New Zealand… – Continue reading
VietNamNet Bridge – The bad news about tax evasion and debt repudiation cases by foreign invested companies has darkened Vietnam’s foreign direct investment (FDI) landscape. Tuoi Tre newspaper has reported that Austrian Harald Biebl, director of the HCM City-based Bach Hop Company, operational in Vietnam since 2005, has fled the… – Continue reading
MONTREAL • Eugene Melnyk, the billionaire owner of the Ottawa Senators and founder of drug maker Biovail Corp., is waging war against the company that now controls his one-time business. Mr. Melnyk alleges that Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. is masquerading as a Canadian company to make use of this country’s… – Continue reading
TAX avoidance is always a hot topic, never more so than with the recent stream of famous individuals involved in the Liberty scheme. The fact that some of these 1,600 stars risk bankruptcy highlights just how serious these cases can be, and the financial and reputational value at stake. The media… – Continue reading
Manila (AFP) – Philippine world boxing champion Manny Pacquiao has won a Supreme Court reprieve in his battle to avoid paying tens of millions of dollars in extra taxes, authorities said Thursday. Pacquiao will not have to post a cash bond of 3.3 billion pesos ($75.2 million) and the government… – Continue reading
Aug 21 (Reuters) – Leumi, Israel’s second-largest bank, reported a smaller-than-expected decline in quarterly net profit, as the lender’s bottom line was hit by a provision to settle a U.S. tax probe. Leumi said on Thursday it earned 290 million shekels ($82 million) in the second quarter, compared with 474… – Continue reading
A tax avoidance scheme that routed a film financing venture’s profits via Employee Benefit Trusts at the behest of the venture’s owner, an ex-accountant, has been blocked by a tribunal. Operated by John Dryburgh, a former partner with Deloitte & Touche, the scheme involved extracting profits from a series of companies named… – Continue reading
Switzerland is cooperating with French tax authorities over an investigation of alleged tax fraud involving former French footballer Marcel Desailly. The notice of Swiss cooperation was published on Tuesday in the Federal Gazette. Desailly, captain of the French football team from 2000 to 2004, allegedly holds or has held assets… – Continue reading
Robert Redford has sued New York State over a personal tax bill that goes back to 2005. Regarded as Hollywood royalty, the Sundance Film Festival founder, celebrated actor, director, and producer is generally considered the godfather of indie films. He has a Patrician air, a golden touch, and liberal values… – Continue reading
The Securities and Exchange Commission wants to make an example of two Texas brothers found by a jury at a civil trial to have acted fraudulently to evade taxes, but a defense lawyer said Wednesday that the more than $750 million sought by the government is “hotly contested.” A Manhattan… – Continue reading
Romanian fashion designer Adina Buzatu was recently prosecuted for tax evasion and money laundry, in a file here the prejudice exceeds some EUR 22.4 million. She was recently placed under accusation by the Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT), according to Digi24. Buzatu is one of the 20… – Continue reading
(Reuters) – A Spanish court will push ahead with the process of prosecuting Argentina and Barcelona forward Lionel Messi for alleged tax evasion despite a recommendation from the public prosecutor the charges be dismissed. The prosecutor argued in June that Messi’s father Jorge was responsible for the family’s finances and… – Continue reading
Green Power CEO and founder Michael Spitzauer pleaded innocent Wednesday to tax evasion. The case has been reassigned to U.S. District Court Judge Sal Mendoza Jr., who was recently appointed to the federal bench. A trial has been tentatively scheduled for this fall. In all, Spitzauer of Kennewick has been… – Continue reading
Sean Hannity, the Fox News prime-time host, threatened last month to leave New York for a tax haven down south. Tiger Woods transplanted himself from California to Florida for the same reason. The actor Gerard Depardieu decamped from France and sought citizenship in Russia after complaining that 85 percent of… – Continue reading
Federal prosecutors continue to add to the multitude of charges filed against Green Power CEO and founder Michael Spitzauer. Spitzauer of Kennewick was indicted this week in connection with tax evasion. In all, he has been indicted on 30 charges, including 16 counts of wire fraud, six counts of money… – Continue reading
Tax authorities in South Korea and the United States will conduct a joint investigation into the allegation that the fugitive Yoo Byung-eun’s family engaged in offshore tax evasion.After the April 16 Sewol ferry disaster, the National Tax Service asked its U.S. counterpart to share intelligence on Yoo, the de facto… – Continue reading
The bank accounts of retired Egyptian football player Mohamed Abu Trika were frozen due to failure to pay dues to the Egyptian Tax Authority (ETA), an official at the Ministry of Finance’s fight against tax evasion department confirmed to the Daily News Egypt. The official said that the “this is… – Continue reading
Popular restaurant chain’s Channel Islands tax haven trust at top of elaborate web of companies is worth £750m A secretive £750m trust located in a Channel Islands tax haven sits at the top of an elaborate offshore web of companies belonging to the family behind the Nando’s chicken chain. The… – Continue reading
Lawyers for convicted tax evader Ty Warner said his sentence of two years’ probation was reasonable, pointing out that the punishment of the Beanie Babies billionaire was consistent with more than half of the offshore banking cases that the government has prosecuted, according to a court filing Thursday. Last October,… – Continue reading
A secret list of account holders reveals how rich Britons are legally exploiting tax havens, despite a UK government crackdown. The identities of thousands of wealthy offshore clients of a major Channel Isles private bank have been leaked to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The individuals include donors to… – Continue reading
Having resolved his tax fraud with an $11.5 million payment, local businessman John Gizzi almost landed himself in prison last month by attending a Republican Party barbecue. “You’re seen as the millionaire who walked away with a probation sentence and bought himself out of federal prison,” U.S. District Judge Frank… – Continue reading
Sentenced in absentia, Nassef Sawiris is also fined LE50 million for refraining from paying due checks to Egypt’s tax authority Egypt’s wealthiest man, Nassef Sawiris, has been sentenced in absentia to three years in prison and fines worth LE50 million on charges of refraining from paying due checks to Egypt’s… – Continue reading
A Spanish prosecutor recommended that Lionel Messi, the captain of Argentina’s national soccer team, be cleared of tax evasion while keeping his father an official suspect. “Messi didn’t participate in the decision making of the management and use of his earnings,” prosecutor Raquel Amado said in a presentation, a copy… – Continue reading
Sir Owen Glenn’s $400million court battle has spread to the Caribbean tax haven of Nevis, where his daughter has been drawn into the bitter fight for control of his fortune. Last week, the Herald on Sunday revealed that Sir Owen was suing business associates David Miller and Peter Dickson in… – Continue reading
Former Bayern Munich president Uli Hoeness began a 3-1/2-year jail sentence on Monday after being convicted in March of evading $40 million in taxes, German media reported on Monday. The state prosecutor in Munich declined to comment on the report and said there would be no official confirmation. Daily Bild… – Continue reading
NASSAU, Bahamas — The government has been urged to implement an investor-citizenship program that would effectively allow high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) to trade investment in The Bahamas for citizenship rights as a means of spurring growth in the economy. Sean McWeeney QC, a partner with law firm Graham Thompson and Co., is advocating… – Continue reading
Luiz Felipe Scolari is the subject of a criminal investigation in Portugal, authorities said Wednesday, bringing an unwelcome distraction for the Brazil coach as his country prepares to host the World Cup. Officials wouldn’t say what the investigation is about. In Portugal, ongoing investigations fall under the country’s judicial secrecy… – Continue reading
Samuel and Charles Wyly used a web of offshore trusts to illegally hide their stock holdings and evade trading limits, a jury found, leaving Samuel Wyly and his brother’s estate potentially liable for as much as $550 million. The panel of eight women and four men today delivered the verdict… – Continue reading
Three members of Take That are reported to have invested in a tax avoidance scheme – so will they join our festival line-up of stars who, through schemes or leaving the country, have avoided tax? Whether by moving country or through schemes and accountants, celebrities finding ways to avoid tax… – Continue reading
The tax evasion trial and conviction of former Bayern Munich president Uli Hoeness triggered a wave of self-disclosures resulting in 16,926 tax dodgers turning themselves in during the first four months of the year, a newspaper reported on Sunday. The Welt am Sonntag newspaper said it had surveyed finance authorities in Germany’s… – Continue reading
Yesterday, headlines in the majority of the press focussed on allegations that Gary Barlow and his Take That band mates had used a “shady investment scheme” in order to avoid paying taxes on their whopping incomes… The Sun reported that following a tribunal, Gary and band mates Mark Owen and… – Continue reading
Beanie Baby creator H. Ty Warner’s sentencing for tax evasion left him on probation, but the recent appeal filing seeks to change his fate. In September 2013 H. Ty Warner, creator of the mid-’90s craze of animal-shaped Beanie Babies, was charged with federal tax evasion stemming from an illegal offshore… – Continue reading
BERLIN — The high-profile tax evasion trial against former Bayern Munich president Uli Hoeness has prompted a surge in the number of Germans turning themselves in to authorities for failing to properly declare their taxes. Munich daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported Wednesday that some 13,000 sought to escape prosecution by submitting… – Continue reading
Texas businessman Sam Wyly told jurors on Wednesday he relied on the advice of his former lawyer in determining whether he needed to disclose stock holdings in offshore trusts at the center of a fraud case brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Wyly, who took the stand for… – Continue reading
Potato king Paul Rennie has told a court he is unable to explain why he sent millions of dollars to tax havens in transactions revealed by a Project Wickenby investigation. The Federal Court heard Mr Rennie had been raided by federal police, who seized documents related to his Griffith-area potato… – Continue reading
The bitter marital split of aviation tycoon Clive Joy has highlighted the issue the role tax efficient offshore trusts can play in lengthy High Court divorces. Recently aviation tycoon Clive Joy hit the headlines, but not for his expertise in aerospace issues. It was because in the course of a bitter… – Continue reading
People who used to know young billionaire-in-exile Serhiy Kurchenko say that if he ever started drawing his financial “chain” on a piece of paper, it would finish up on the ceiling. Kurchenko’s chain is made up of hundreds of fake Ukrainian companies, dozens of offshore firmsand more than 600 people who… – Continue reading
Texas tycoons Sam and Charles Wyly employed a labyrinthine system of offshore trusts to conceal stock trades in four companies on whose boards they sat, netting themselves more than $550 million in undisclosed profits, a U.S. government lawyer told a federal jury on Thursday. “This is a case about lies,… – Continue reading
More bits of information have emerged regarding China’s secretive, young billionaire Perenna Kei. After Forbes Magazine put Kei on their list of the world’s youngest billionaires, the search for details began. Most publications could not confirm her identity, as several photos were published mistakenly labeling Kei. A new photo of… – Continue reading
Corporate Tax Avoidance: Inditex, the Spanish owner of Zara, this week announced its first fall in annual profits in five years as the world’s biggest fashion retailer invested in stores while foreign exchange rates moved against it. However, Amancio Ortega Gaona, founding chairman of Inditex, with a stake of 60%… – Continue reading
MUNICH, Germany — German prosecutors said Monday they won’t appeal against Uli Hoeness’ 3 1/2-year sentence for tax evasion, clearing the way for the former Bayern Munich president to start his prison term. Hoeness, one of German football’s most prominent figures, was convicted last Thursday of evading about 28.5 million… – Continue reading
Celebrities and major companies locked in legal battles over tax-avoidance schemes will be forced to pay up before their cases are resolved, under new rules to be introduced in this week’s Budget. The rules will hit 65,000 companies and individuals in dispute with the taxman over their use of complex… – Continue reading
BERLIN — When all of his cards were played and Uli Hoeness, the Bayern Munich president and German soccer legend, faced the prospect of a protracted and high-profile appeal of his conviction on charges of tax evasion, he chose to take his punishment. In a surprise move that came hours… – Continue reading
KUALA LUMPUR: Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) should tap Hong Kong’s access to the markets in China, Japan and South Korea to gain tax advantages under the double-taxation deduction pact signed between Malaysia and HK. Hong Kong Trade Development Council deputy executive director, Margaret Fong, said HK SMEs paid five… – Continue reading
The young Ukrainian ex-billionaire Serhiy Kurchenko, now widely suspected of being a front man for overthrown President Viktor Yanukovych’s family, clearly liked offshore destinations. His companies registered in offshore zones are now accused of trading in oil products using a tax evasion scheme that cost Ukraine’s government an estimated $1… – Continue reading
Bob Geldof, Anne Robinson and Victoria Beckham said to be also among the 1,000 household names affected They each paid a minimum £100,000 to invest in a movie venture that promised to combine box office hits with tempting tax breaks A string of celebrities from David Beckham to Andrew Lloyd… – Continue reading
BERLIN: German football legend Uli Hoeness (pix), boss of champion club Bayern Munich, will face a high-profile tax evasion trial from Monday, accused of having stashed away millions in Switzerland. The folksy 62-year-old Bavarian club president, who also runs a flourishing sausage company, was arrested and bailed almost a year ago… – Continue reading
