Financial Transparency Coalition

The European Court of Justice on November 22, 2022, made a ruling that reversed much of the progress we have made

Starting tomorrow a group of government officials and experts belonging to the world’s leading anti-money laundering organisation – the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) – will be meeting in Paris. On the agenda is the adoption of a document on an issue that has major implications for the fight against crime, corruption and tax evasion around the world. It’s a shame nobody outside of this small circle of experts from governments and international organisations has had a chance to see the document before it comes out. According to the FATF website, at its upcoming plenary meeting the organisation will adopt...

according to Jonathan Guthrie of the Financial Times, in discussing the decision of HSBC to close down its operations in Panama (Corruption Perceptions Index score in 2012: 38 out of 100). The decision was purportedly to increase profits – but maybe not in the way one would expect.

This is the current message that the EU’s current anti-money laundering rules send to those in a position to launder the proceeds of tax evasion. It is a crime to launder the proceeds of tax evasion if the tax evader you help, gets caught and goes to prison for more than a year, 11months and its fine. For those considering whether or not tax evasion is a serious crime, it is worth pointing out that a Christian Aid study found that even with a very conservative estimate the money lost by developing countries to tax evasion by multinational companies...