Financial Transparency Coalition

WASHINGTON – The United States’ dual pledge to implement the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) and to support legislation that would stop U.S. states from allowing secretive front companies to be set up represents an important step forward in the global fight against corruption and corporate secrecy, said campaign group Global Witness. Announced on Tuesday, September 20th by President Obama, these measures form key elements of the U.S. Open Government Partnership National Action Plan.

NEW YORK – The President announced his intention today to advocate for Congress to adopt laws requiring the disclosure of beneficial ownership for corporations at the time of company formation, an idea already proposed by Senators Carl Levin and Chuck Grassley in S. 1483, the Incorporation Transparency and Law Enforcement Assistance Act, as well as a U.S. commitment to implement the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), as part of the launch of the new government transparency initiative, the Open Government Partnership.

As The Guardian reports this morning:

More than a third of the subsidiaries owned by major energy and mining companies including Shell, BP and Glencore are based in “secrecy jurisdictions” where company accounts are not publicly available, according to a report. The study by Publish What You Pay Norway, which campaigns for transparent accounting among oil, gas and mining giants, claims that populations in resource-rich countries are losing out because they are unable to extract financial information from businesses operating on their soil or off their seaboards. “Extractive industry giants’ corporate ownership structures, their use of secrecy jurisdictions and the...

Eurodad's Alex Marriage Details How a Robust Country-by-Country Reporting Standard Should Look The European Commission will make a proposal for introducing country-by-country reporting (CBC) for extractives industries and possibly forestry companies at some point this autumn. This comes following an EU Council request earlier in 2011 that called upon

“the Commission to come forward with initiatives on the disclosure of financial information by companies working in the extractive industry, including the possible adoption of a country-by-country reporting requirement, International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for the extractive industry, and the monitoring of third-country legislation.”

This will then be submitted to...