Financial Transparency Coalition

According to a recent editorial from The Guardian, the illicit activities that drive capital flight, such as drug trafficking and terrorist financing, are actually supported by legal infrastructure. Namely, the lack of transparency in regions designated as "tax havens" allows for elaborate tax avoidance schemes and money laundering that funds these sorts of activities. As an example, banking company HSBC reportedly held a Cayman Islands subsidiary that "handled some 60,000 accounts," which "drug lords used . . . to fuel their jet-set lives." According to the newspaper, politicians must address the issue of tax haven abuse. In affected countries such...

Beyond enabling tax dodging, tax haven secrecy facilitates transnational crime, financial fraud and international terrorism, writes Robert Morgenthau, the legendary former Manhattan District Attorney, in the New York Times.

LONDON - The OECD’s Global Forum peer review, the main mechanism for assessing the effectiveness of Tax Information Exchange Agreements (TIEAs), is seriously flawed and therefore contributes to failure in reducing rampant tax evasion. The findings of a new Tax Justice Network report published today run directly counter to claims made by the OECD that its TIEAs represent the new international standard on tax transparency.

I’m delighted to see a paper with the above title by John Christensen has been published in the Journal of Crime, Law and Social Change.