In Focus
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearing "Tax Haven Banks and U.S. Tax Compliance."
Subcommittee report: "Tax Havens and U.S. Tax Compliance."
August, 2006 subcommittee report "Tax Haven Abuses: The Enablers, The Tools, and Secrecy."
Watch video of GFI director Raymond Baker talk about tax havens.
GFI in the News
G-8 Finance Ministers to Discuss OECD Blacklist
TaxAnalysts, June 2008
Raymond Baker comments on the possibility of efforts proposed at last week's meeting of G8 finance ministers to revisit the OECD blacklist of uncooperative tax havens.
Death and Taxes
Christian Aid Report, May 2008
Raymond Baker is cited in a striking new report released by international poverty alleviation group, Christian Aid, on how tax evasion by the world's richest hurts the world's poorest and contributes to the rising number of infant mortality in developing countries.
Listen to podcast about the report
_____________________________________Which Is the Bigger Challenge: Tax Havens or High Taxes?
The Wall Street Journal, April 10, 2008
GFI director Raymond Baker and Dan Mitchell, senior fellow specializing in tax policy at the Cato Institute, discuss the problem of tax evasion.
_____________________________________
Read Raymond Baker's article Illicit Finance: The Missing Link in Development," published in the latest edition of Monday Developments.
GFI's Director discusses how curtailing capital flight out of poor countries is critical to achieving success in economic development, poverty alleviation, and international security.
____________________________________
Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet.
Sachs Presses Marshall Plan for Poor, Ignores Thieving Leaders
Bloomberg News, March 26, 2008
"Western countries sink some $50 billion in aid into poorer countries annually, he wrote, then take back 10 times that amount by laundering dirty money fleeing those lands. Keeping that $500 billion at home in poor countries could do more to alleviate poverty than all our aid, export promotion, foreign investment and free-trade policies put together," he argued.
What's New
Legislative Action Needed to Tackle Scourge of Tax Evasion, Says Global Financial Integrity
Contact: Monique Perry Danziger, 202-293-0740
Washington, D.C., July 18, 2008– The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations’ hearing Thursday, “Tax Havens and U.S. Tax Compliance” offered rare insight into a shadowy world of secretive banking practices and reported figures for estimated revenue lost through tax evasion and “abusive tax schemes" in the tens of billions.
Global Financial Integrity (GFI) urges Congress to continue its assault on banking secrecy, tax havens, and tax evasion by following the recommendation of Subcommittee chairman Senator Carl Levin (D, MI) to pass the “Stop Tax Haven Abuse Act” which the Senator introduced last year after a year-long Subcommittee investigation into tax havens and tax evasion.
Tax Havens, Evasion to be Target of Senate Hearings, Investigation
Contact: Monique Perry Danziger, 202-293-0740
Washington, D.C. July 16, 2008 – Global Financial Integrity (GFI) applauds the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations’ exploration into the role of offshore banks in U.S. tax evasion. The Subcommittee will be holding a hearing on “Tax Haven Banks and U.S. Tax Compliance,” Thursday, July 17th to investigate if and how financial institutions located in offshore jurisdictions, including Liechtenstein and Switzerland, facilitate illicit financial practices such as tax evasion.
“Tax evasion deprives the U.S. of tens of millions of dollars in uncollected revenue every year,” said GFI director Raymond Baker. “Money that is needed to pay for things like healthcare, education, and infrastructure is flowing abroad to offshore secrecy jurisdictions. It is time to tackle this illegal and detrimental practice.”
“I was employed by UBS . . . I was incentivized to do this business,” explained ex-UBS bank employee Bradley Birkenfeld when asked why he participated in a scheme to help a wealthy client evade taxes.
Mr. Birkenfeld, pleaded guilty last week in a Florida federal court to helping billionaire real estate developer Igor Olenicoff hide $200 million in assets from U.S. tax authorities. As per his plea agreement, the former UBS employee submitted a seven-page "statement of facts" detailing "everything he knows about what's going on at UBS," in the words of Mr. Birkenfeld's lawyer.
Birkenfeld "Statement of Facts"
Government’s “John Doe” filing
Read Forbes 2006 piece on Olenicoff
The Billionaire with the Empty Pockets
Today's Top Stories
UBS pledges to crack down on Swiss bank accounts
Financial Times, July 18, 2008
UBS, the world's leading wealth manager, will no longer let US residents put money in Swiss bank accounts beyond the reach of US regulators, a senior bank executive has told a Senate subcommittee investigating tax haven abuses.
LGT Group's Kieber Says Bank Helped Clients Break Law
Bloomberg, July 18, 2008
July 17 (Bloomberg) -- LGT Group, the bank owned by Liechtenstein's royal family, used both ``highly sophisticated'' and ``surprisingly simple tricks'' to help clients move assets around the world and evade taxes, a former bank employee said.
LGT routinely routed clients' money through networks of shell companies in the British Virgin Islands, Panama, and Nigeria, Heinrich Kieber told the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations in a videotaped statement. Kieber said he learned about the bank's secretive practices when he worked from 2000 to 2002 on a project to scan LGT documents into computers.
IRS asks Swiss for help probing $100B in tax evasion
USA Today, July 18, 2008
Swiss Finance Ministry spokesman Jean-Michel Treyvaud said tax authorities received the IRS' official request for "administrative assistance" Thursday.
Capitalism's Achilles Heel
 | Capitalism's Achilles Heel: Dirty Money and How to Renew the Free-Market System Raymond W. Baker |
A fascinating insider’s look at the way criminals, terrorists and businesspeople move money around the world, impoverishing billions and corrupting capitalism’s ideals of fair play.