A new report from the Internal Revenue Service indicated that the upper-echelon of wealth is hoarding more money than we initially thought, reported The Washington Post. We all know how much money the one-percent hoards, but what about the top one-thousandth percent? To be apart of that group, one must… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: Several countries, including tax havens like British Virgin Islands, Cyprus and Jersey, have begun sharing information with Indian authorities, in a development that is expected to boost the government’s efforts in tracking black money stashed abroad. Sources said some of the information had already been verified, adding that… – Continue reading
Crucial deadlines are approaching for millions of U.S. taxpayers who live abroad or have offshore financial ties. For expatriates, the annual income-tax filing deadline is normally June 15, instead of April 15. In addition, all U.S. taxpayers with offshore accounts totaling more than $10,000 in 2014–regardless of where they live–have… – Continue reading
The government scheme dubbed “stability savings account”, which lets people repatriate offshore money, should be scrapped because it is making Hungary into a “gangsters’ paradise”, the green LMP party said. It also undermines tax morale and the credibility of the tax system, László Heltai, the party’s economic spokesman, said in… – Continue reading
A businessman caught in a money-laundering sting helped the U.S. prosecute a foreign business — and now he’s seeking $22.2 million from the government as a reward. The U.S. Tax Court ruled Tuesday in favor of the informant, allowing his claim to proceed after the Internal Revenue Service earlier denied… – Continue reading
There’s been a preliminary investigation into the amount of money that secret bank accounts Belgians have in Switzerland can yield for the Belgian treasury. It turns out the answer is EUR 540 million. Finance Minister Johan Van Overtveldt (Flemish Nationalists) revealed the figures to financial newspaper De Tijd. “However, the… – Continue reading
KARACHI: A district and sessions court remanded on Wednesday four more suspects in Axact-gate scandal for one day. The four – Muhammad Rizwan, Atif Hussain, Imran Ahmed Khan and Adnan Saboor – who were recently taken into custody after some leads given by the detained suspects were presented by the… – Continue reading
As Cayman finds itself at the heart of what may be the world’s biggest ever corruption scandal, following the arrest of local football boss, Jeffrey Webb, the premier has defended the jurisdiction in a statement from his office about the FIFA probe. Alden McLaughlin said that local law enforcement agencies… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: CBDT has issued fresh instructions to the taxman to ensure that information on individuals holding black money abroad is strictly kept secret as it stressed that any “careless” act could give an excuse to the data supplying country for not helping India in the future. “In many countries,… – Continue reading
Belgium is seeking to retrieve about €540m (£390, $600m) in unpaid tax after its probe into 829 accounts in HSBC Private Suisse Bank in Geneva. Belgian finance minister Johan Van Overtveldt earlier made the estimate, which has been confirmed by various media outlets. The people, who were found to be… – Continue reading
Sinn Féin TD calls on Taoiseach to defend constitutional protection Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald has again defended her use Dáil privilege to name former politicians who were accused of having offshore bank accounts to evade tax In an Irish Times piece on Tuesday, businessman Denis O’Brien was critical of… – Continue reading
Last week, the Justice Department announced that it had reached resolutions with four more Swiss banks under the terms of the DOJ Swiss Bank Program. The latest banks to resolve their U.S. tax issues are the following: Société Générale Private Banking (Lugano-Svizzera); MediBank AG; LBBW (Schweiz) AG; and Scobag Privatbank… – Continue reading
Barclays has launched an internal review into whether its accounts were used for corrupt payments by FIFA officials, a banking source told AFP on Sunday. Standard Chartered has also said it was investigating payments cited in the US indictment. UK-headquartered Barclays, Standard Chartered and HSBC were among more than a… – Continue reading
British Virgin Islands, Caymans and Turks & Caicos feature heavily in justice department indictment of senior football officials British overseas tax havens play a key role in what US authorities have called “rampant, systemic and deep-rooted” corruption in the world of football, analysis by the Observer reveals. The 164-page US… – Continue reading
UBS Global Asset Management (Taiwan) Ltd (瑞銀環球資產管理台灣) has received Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) approval to launch a consulting service in Taiwan via an offshore banking unit, which might help generate US$3 billion in three years for its asset management business. UBS Taiwan, which is to launch the service in July,… – Continue reading
A unit of Societe Generale SA based in Switzerland and three other banks agreed to pay a total of $2.2 million in penalties for helping American clients avoid taxes. The settlement comes under a U.S. program that lets Swiss banks avoid prosecution if they agree to cooperate with prosecutors and… – Continue reading
The US Department of Justice (DoJ) has announced that four Swiss banks have reached a resolution with the Government under the DoJ Tax Division’s regularization program. The DoJ’s Swiss Bank Program was signed by the two countries on August 29, 2013. It provides a framework for Swiss banks that were… – Continue reading
A South Florida man who ran a $15 million pill mill operation that sold hundreds of thousands of addictive painkillers to drug dealers and addicts was sentenced Thursday to 14 years in federal prison. Joel Shumrak, 67, of Boca Raton, has been locked up since June when federal agents raided… – Continue reading
CHARGES laid out by the United States Department of Justice on 14 high-ranking FIFA officials may never have come to a head had it not been for the behind the scenes workings of former FIFA executive Chuck Blazer. In 2011, after being confronted by the Internal Revenue Service in regards… – Continue reading
Thousands of Indian citizens in the US – from IT workers, health professionals, students and everyone else under the sun – will soon be innocent victims to snooping by the Indian government. If an Indian citizen holds a bank account in the US, minute details about his/her bank account will… – Continue reading
After Switzerland initiated measures to regulate its banks, most of the unaccounted money stashed in Swiss banks is suspected to have been diverted to countries like Mauritius and Singapore. The Special Investigation Team on black money has taken cognisance of the issue raised by the enforcement agencies. “Although the Swiss… – Continue reading
Bern, Switzerland: As India tries to uncover who has stashed untaxed money abroad, Switzerland is, in an unusual deviation from its super-secretive banking rules, releasing the names of people who are being investigated for alleged tax evasion in their countries of origin. Among the seven Indians named so far by… – Continue reading
Bangladesh Bank will take all possible measures to liberalise country’s foreign-exchange rules and regulations for attracting foreign investors to a number of proposed economic zones. The decision was taken at a meeting between the central bank and the Bangladesh Economic Zones Authority (BEZA) at the BB headquarters Tuesday. Presided over… – Continue reading
Switzerland and the European Union have signed an agreement providing for the automatic exchange of banking information, effective 2018. On Wednesday, Swiss State Secretary for International Financial Matters Jacques de Watteville signed the accord in Brussels along with EU Tax Commissioner Pierre Moscovici and Latvian Finance Minister Janis Reirs. Before… – Continue reading
People with non-domiciled tax status living in the UK who wish to preserve the anonymity of their offshore finances must notify HMRC by 30 May, warns international law firm Pinsent Masons. Otherwise full details of their offshore accounts, trusts and companies held in Crown Dependencies or British Overseas Territories will… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: On a day when Prime Minister Narendra Modi hit out, albeit indirectly, at the Congress for looting the country for 60 years, Swiss authorities named five Indians among several foreign nationals with Swiss bank accounts. Their names have been made public by Switzerland in its federal gazette. The… – Continue reading
Switzerland has begun online publication of names of foreigners and foreign firms wanted in tax probes by their countries of origin, including Germany. American citizens are identified only by their initials. The Swiss Sunday newspaper “Sonntagszeitung” said the alpine nation was flooded with formal tracing requests from foreign tax authorities…. – Continue reading
PETALING JAYA, Malaysia – Former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has accused Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak of lying when he told Parliament that money held by government investment arm 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) is being kept in Singapore. “No money was banked into BSI Bank in Singapore…. – Continue reading
An investigation is underway after the blunder by the island’s tax body Income Tax Division released more than 500 taxpayer’s email addresses Isle of Man is home to many rich and famous trying to slash their tax bills The Isle of Man – a renowned tax haven for the rich… – Continue reading
Actor John Malkovich has sued the French daily paper Le Monde over false reports saying he had a secret Swiss account. The defamation suit is the latest proof that having an undisclosed account in Switzerland—or perhaps anywhere—is an embarrassment for anyone. Whether politician, public figure, or anyone else, no one… – Continue reading
On May 8, 2015, the United States Department of Justice announced that it had entered into a “non-prosecution agreement” (NPA) with Swiss bank Vadian Bank AG under the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Swiss bank program. In its press release announcing the NPA, the DOJ said, “the department has opened investigations… – Continue reading
The IRS’s scrutiny of tax avoidance in offshore locations has discouraged bidders from taking over reinsurers, potentially reducing the companies’ value. Montpelier Re Holdings Ltd. and Platinum Underwriters Holdings Ltd., both based in Bermuda, have each said in recent regulatory filings that potential suitors backed away last year because of… – Continue reading
Tuesday, June 30th is the filing due date for the Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts, known as the “FBAR.” A “U.S. person” is required to file an FBAR if: (1) the U.S. person has a financial interest in, or signature authority over, at least one financial account located… – Continue reading
Taipei, May 16 (CNA) Chinese yuan-dominated deposits held by banks operating in Taiwan hit a new high as of the end of April, according to the Central Bank of the Republic of China. Market analysts said that the increase in the balance of Taiwanese banks’ yuan deposits largely resulted from… – Continue reading
Euro Pacific Bank Ltd has selected Temenos’ T24 core banking platform and anti-money laundering (AML) solution. It will be delivered in the cloud, via Microsoft Azure, and is intended to offer better private banking services to the Caribbean offshore bank’s local and global customers. Temenos’ T24 cloud-based core banking package… – Continue reading
If you are American and have a non-U.S. bank account, chances are that you’ve received a letter from your bank asking for your tax details. It may seem odd that banks everywhere want to know if you are compliant with the IRS. But for the U.S. government, that’s the beauty… – Continue reading
BANKS are unable to directly recover the huge sums of money stolen from their customers via online transactions if the cash is stashed in offshore accounts, its association said yesterday. The Kenya Bankers Association chief executive officer Habil Olaka said most countries like Mauritius or Switzerland where fraudsters hide the… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: The Special Investigation Team on black money informed the Supreme Court on Tuesday that 339 accounts in HSBC bank held by Indians had a net amount of Rs 6,400 crore on which the income tax department has raised a demand of Rs 4,520 crore. “Amount of Rs 237… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI:Senior lawyer and former BJP leader Ram Jethmalani on Tuesday told the Supreme Court that all the election promises made by the NDA regarding black money were “false” and that the government hadn’t made any serious effort to bring back the ill-gotten money stashed away in tax havens. Jethmalani… – Continue reading
FATCA made it extremely difficult for US citizens to open offshore bank accounts and this is applied to all, who hold a US passport (even if they lived abroad) are liable for tax in the US as well as US non-citizen who are tax residents in the US. The banks… – Continue reading
Switzerland’s banks will benefit from the global crackdown on tax avoidance, the president of the country’s association of foreign banks and head of HSBC’s (HSBA.L) Swiss private banking arm said on Tuesday, reports Reuters. The Alpine nation famed for its banking secrecy is bowing to international pressure by committing to… – Continue reading
The Federal Reserve barred Markus Walder, the former head of North America offshore banking at Credit Suisse Group AG, and four other previously indicted ex-bankers at the company from employment in the banking industry. The five were indicted for conspiracy to defraud the U.S government by assisting U.S. citizens’ evasion… – Continue reading
There are no untouchables in Croatia when it comes to tax evasion, Finance Minister Boris Lalovac said on Tuesday, commenting on investigations of several Croatian citizens with huge amounts in foreign bank accounts. They have been called to the Tax Administration to explain “such large amounts and declare their assets,”… – Continue reading
The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is planning to broaden the use of subpoenas of documents in cases where the name of a taxpayer under investigation is not known. The so-called John Doe summonses were a breakthrough for the IRS in tackling offshore tax evasion when they were first addressed to… – Continue reading
Three of the biggest banks in Moldova reached the brink of collapse in November after suffering losses totaling $US1 billion – a shocking sum in an impoverished Eastern European country with a gross domestic product of less than $US8 billion. Now shock is turning to anger. In a report made… – Continue reading
The Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione) has decided that the Italian tax authorities may use details of foreign bank accounts in their tax compliance efforts, even if the data therein was obtained illegally. In a move that is thought likely to push more Italians with undeclared assets abroad towards… – Continue reading
Nedbank Private Wealth is an international private bank headquartered in the Isle of Man, a self-governing British Crown dependency. The bank has been growing its presence in the Middle East since January 2011 through a representative office established in Dubai and licensed by the UAE Central Bank. “Our presence in… – Continue reading
All the world’s major banks have connections between each other and work together in a secret network to help people evade taxes, whistleblower and former HSBC IT engineer Hervé Falciani said yesterday, warning that illegal offshore transactions can’t be carried out through one single bank but only with the help… – Continue reading
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC, 金管會) said it is updating regulations on bank mergers for an announcement by the end of May. FSC Chairman William Tseng (曾銘宗) said the commission is studying bank merger regulations that could facilitate the formation of large-scale institutions that compete better in the Asia-Pacific region…. – Continue reading
The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act is meeting with some success in prompting foreign banks to disclose the holdings of U.S. taxpayers to the Internal Revenue Service, according to a former IRS official. FATCA was included as part of the HIRE Act of 2010 and requires foreign financial institutions to… – Continue reading
