Financial Transparency Coalition

US Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus and US House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel today introduced legislation aimed at curtailing offshore tax evasion. From Reuters:

Under the proposed bill, foreign banks would be forced to disclose information about American customers, or face a 30 percent tax on their income from U.S. financial assets.

The legislation would crack down on shell companies by requiring a foreign corporation to give the U.S. Treasury the names of Americans who own more than 10 percent of its shares.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A proposal to stop rich Americans from stashing assets offshore to evade taxes, by slapping penalties on individuals and foreign financial institutions, was introduced on Tuesday in the U.S. Congress.

WASHINGTON – Roberto Cittadini of Bellevue, Wash., pleaded guilty today to filing a false tax return, the Justice Department and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced. Cittadini appeared today before Magistrate Judge Mary Alice Theiler in Seattle and accepted responsibility for concealing nearly $2 million in Swiss bank accounts. According to court documents and statements made in court, Cittadini, a retired sales manager for Boeing, failed to report income from bank accounts under his control at UBS AG in Switzerland on his individual income tax returns from 2001 through 2003. Additionally, Cittadini failed to file a Report of Foreign Bank...

A statement released by Mars Group Kenya, a Kenyan anti-corruption organization, this past week clearly shows an awareness and distaste for the role played by international financial organizations in financing corrupt regimes, as well as an appreciation for recent U.S. action to pressure Kenyan politicians to push for government reform. Pressure from the U.S. came last week in the form of 15 letters from the U.S. government to top Kenyan officials, “warning them of possible travel bans if they did not cooperate in instituting reforms.” While many government officials have come out decisively against the actions...