Financial Transparency Coalition

It’s really very strange to note that Jersey Finance have issued a report criticising Christian Aid’s reports on transfer mispricing. There are a number of very good reasons for thinking it so, even before I turn to the deficiencies in the report they have issued. First of all, what, might one ask, has this to do with Jersey? It’s a good question, because it does not feature in those reports Christian Aid have issued. Nor would it seem likely that it should. Christian Aid’s work relates to mispricing of goods, not services. More than 50% of Jersey’s GDP is generated...

Washington — A new report released today from Global Financial Integrity (GFI) on private, non-resident deposits in secrecy jurisdictions finds that the United States, United Kingdom, and the Cayman Islands are the most popular destinations for financial deposits by non-residents. Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Hong Kong also make the top 10 list of destinations.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - The Group of 20 major nations may blacklist countries that have lax financial regulation and impose sanctions on them, mirroring its crackdown on tax havens, Chancellor Alistair Darling was quoted as saying.

GFI has been known to repeat (and then repeat again) that for every $1 of aid that enters the developing world through the front door, $10 escapes out the back in illicit financial flows (for my explanation of these flows and their the magnitude, see: 10 times ODA, but what is that in Apple Pies?). While many people grasp the enormity of this number, few seem to appreciate what this means or how these flows can affect development. Some people even go so far as to say, “Why should we care? That money wasn’t going...