Financial Transparency Coalition

MIAMI — The Swiss and U.S. governments announced a deal Wednesday to settle American demands for the identities of suspected tax dodgers, despite Switzerland's vaunted bank secrecy. But they kept all details under wraps, including how many of the 52,000 names sought by the IRS from banking giant UBS AG will be revealed.

It's just been reported that US and Swiss governmnet authorities have initialed a settlement that would bring about an end to the UBS legal saga. According to the Washington Post:

In a conference call Wednesday morning with the federal judge presiding over the case, Justice Department lawyer Stuart D. Gibson said the parties had initialed agreements and that they would ask the judge to dismiss the matter when the final documents are signed.

Terms of the deal were not immediately disclosed, leaving unclear what each side gained or conceded.

So we still...

Washington Post - U.S. and Swiss negotiators have initialed a settlement that averts a legal showdown over the U.S. government's landmark challenge to Swiss bank secrecy, a government lawyer said Wednesday.

ZURICH -- The Swiss cabinet held an extraordinary meeting on UBS AG's problems with U.S. tax authorities, a move that could signal Switzerland is close to bowing to the U.S. on demands to hand over data.