Financial Transparency Coalition

While the headlines are full of information that governments did not intend to release, European ministers of finance including UK Chancellor George Osborne last week agreed to a draft directive outlining a powerful new basis for the automatic exchange of tax information between jurisdictions – a directive which, if it does what it says on the tin, would be a dramatic step towards the end for European tax havens. This Tuesday 7 December there was a meeting in Brussels of the Economic and Financial Affairs council (EcoFin, effectively Europe’s council of finance ministers). The press release (still provisional)...

It’s been argued – even to their shame by Labour politicians – that it’s inappropriate to target individual companies when protesting about tax avoidance. That’s wrong, for three reasons. First, the decision to tax avoid or not is that of the individual company. No one asks them to. Despite the claims made by some company directors and some apologists for this abuse, company directors are under no obligation to minimise their tax bills. Indeed, if doing so increases the risk within their companies it’s quite easy to argue that they’re acting against...

This report "A confused economy", highlights the distortions between the real economy and the indicators that guide the G20 and the International Financial Institutions. Investments, trade, savings, production- the report shows how the use of offshore financial centres makes any measurement of these indicators impossible. At the heart of this economic lie, the report points to the important role of multinationals and banks- the top users of tax havens.

Reposted from the TJN blog: Sometimes a picture speaks more clearly than words can. Now, courtesy of something that FT Alphaville has just pointed out, we bring you this: Look at all those jurisdictions inside the black circle. All secrecy jurisdictions, except for France and Germany. Widen the circle a little, and look at the