Financial Transparency Coalition

The Task Force on Financial Integrity and Economic Development is discussing beneficial ownership. As Elise Bean from the Senate Committee on Investigations says the problem is:

•U.S. states form nearly 2 million new corporations and LLCs each year, without knowing who owns them. •The failure to collect ownership information invites wrongdoers to misuse U.S. companies for terrorism, money laundering, tax evasion, or other crimes.

The Tax Justice Network got into mighty trouble last year for naming the US as the world’s premier secrecy jurisdiction. But the truth is that TJN was right. And the US knows it.

The Task Force on Financial Integrity and Economic Development conference in Bergen starting on 28 September also sees a side event on that day when Danish NGO IBIS and a range of its partner launch a new report. That report – entitled ‘Investments for Development: Derailed to Tax Havens: A report on the use of tax havens by Development Finance Institutions’ – has been written by UK based chartered accountant Richard Murphy (me), the director of Tax Research UK, a member organisation of the Co-ordinating Committee. The report, which is sponsored by IBIS, NCA, CRBM, Eurodad, Forum Syd...

The Isle of Man Today web site carries the following back handed compliment today, the following being an edited (shortened) version of the story:

We have also written a story about a letter from a group who thinks the Isle of Man should ditch zero-10 company tax. The group of 12 people – including a high profile charity worker – says that we’d be better off in the long run and have a better reputation if we re-introduced company taxes. You might remember that a few weeks ago (August 10, to be precise) we ran a story...

The FT reports:

The US Treasury is close to issuing rules to force banks worldwide to hand over up to 5m Americans’ account details in an assault on tax evasion that financial institutions say is unworkable. Tens of thousands of banks, fund managers, insurers and hedge funds face having to give the names of US clients with at least $50,000 of assets to the Internal Revenue Service under the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, passed in March.

Institutions are stepping up lobbying ahead of guidance from the US Treasury on implementation of the law....