The U.K. will force its overseas territories, including some well-known corporate secrecy havens, to reveal the names of company owners in these locations.

The United Kingdom is to force its overseas territories, including the Cayman Islands, British Virgin Islands and other well-known corporate secrecy havens, to reveal the names of the ultimate owners behind companies in these remote locations.

The surprise move, which until Tuesday had not been supported by prime minister Theresa May’s government, is a victory for corporate transparency campaigners who have long claimed that offshore secrecy encourages and enables corruption, tax evasion, money laundering and other crimes around the world.

It comes two years after the ICIJ’s Panama Papers investigation showed one in every two companies found in Mossack Fonseca’s files — the controversial law firm at heart of the scandal — was incorporated in the BVI. Mossack Fonseca closed down in March.

Duncan Hames, of Transparency International UK, said “these jurisdictions have long been the Achilles’ heel of our defenses against dirty money.”

Global Witness, a nonprofit campaigner against corruption, said the U.K.’s intervention was “a huge win in the fight against corruption tax dodging and money laundering.”

Many campaigners credited investigative work by ICIJ, including the Panama Papers and the Paradise Papers, and its partners for highlighting controversial practices in the offshore world.

The U.K.’s 14 overseas territories also include Anguilla, Gibraltar, Bermuda, Montserrat and the Turks & Caicos Islands. Their constitutional relationship with the U.K. is slightly different to that of the Crown Dependencies of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man — none of which will be subject to the new rules…..icij.org

Not too stressed about the Cambridge Analytica scandal? Perhaps you should be.

Facebook is so embarrassed by the Cambridge Analytica data scandal that it took out expensive adverts in UK and US media last week to apologise to its users. But if you were appalled by the way in which personal data on Facebook appears to have been manipulated for political ends, have you thought about how this data could also be used to target your finances? Data security experts warn that too few people understand how their data can make them vulnerable to financial crime.

Facebook shares fell 5% Tuesday on reports that CEO Mark Zuckerberg agreed to testify in front of Congress about the company’s data scandal.

The crisis began on March 16 after Facebook (FB) said it was suspending data analysis company Cambridge Analytica for allegedly harvesting data from more than 50 million Facebook users. Cambridge Analytica worked on Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

Since then, Facebook’s stock has plunged 18%, wiping out nearly $80 billion from the social networking giant’s market value in the process. Zuckerberg’s net worth has fallen by about $14 billion. (He is still worth $61 billion, though).

Tech stocks in general have taken a hit since the Facebook allegations first came to light. The Nasdaq is down 6%…Independent

This report provides a summary of the anti-money laundering (AML) and countering the financing of terrorism (CFT) measures in place in Ukraine as at the date of the on-site visit (between 27 March and 8 April 2017). It analyses the level of compliance with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) 40 Recommendations and the level of effectiveness of Ukraine’s AML/CFT system, and provides recommendations on how the system could be strengthened.

Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing measures Ukraine:
Fifth Round Mutual Evaluation Report

Harm Bengen
www.w-t-w.org/en/harm-bengen

U.S. proposes sanctions on the Latvian ABLV Bank* 
over money-laundering concerns. The U.S. is seeking to impose sanctions on ABLV Bank, the third largest financial institution in Latvia by assets, by prohibiting the bank from opening or maintaining a correspondent account in the United States due to money laundering concerns, the US Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) said on Tuesday…RIGA-Reuters
US treasury bans latvian bank over money-laundering concerns

According to Association of Latvian Commercial Banks, ABLV is the third largest bank in Latvia with assets of around 3.6 billion euros in September 2017.
ABLV NPRM 2018-02-12 * Currently, ABLV Bank, AS is the largest independent private bank in Latvia, having representative offices of the Group in many CIS countries. The bank’s controlling interest is held by Ernests Bernis and Oļegs Fiļs. The bank’s other shareholders include top management, employees, and the bank’s long-term partners and customers.

ABLV Bank is a member of the Association of Latvian Commercial Banks, which protects interests of Latvian banks both in domestic and foreign markets, certifies banking specialists, and arranges professional seminars. Also, ABLV Bank takes active part in operations of other professional institutions, which aim at developing Latvia as regional financial centre.

The Tax Justice Network released their Financial Secrecy Index, ranking Switzerland and the United States as the top two countries most attractive for tax evaders and money launderers. This is the second time in a row that the US has risen on the index, marking a fall in terms of transparency.

The Tax Justice Network just released their 2018 Financial Secrecy Index Switzerland and the United States were followed in the index by Hong Kong and the Cayman Islands, an autonomous British Overseas Territory. The index is unique in that it ranks countries based on a number of criteria, rather than creating a “blacklist” where countries are either labeled as tax havens or not.

 According to a statement by the Tax Justice Network (TJN), the United States has moved up in the rankings because it “refuses to take part in international initiatives to share tax information with other countries, and has failed to end anonymous companies and trusts”.
OCCRP.org
Please click here to access the interactive overview map:
Financialsecrecyindex.com

A two-day workshop involving over sixty financial investigators in Basel, Switzerland has seen Europol and Interpol agree upon a range of measures designed to ramp up efforts to combat the use of cryptocurrencies for money laundering and terrorist financing purposes. The event saw attendance from over 60 international financial investigators.
Crypto Finance Conference 2018

The price of a Bitcoin, which first surpassed the gold price nearly a year ago, is now worth more than seven times the value of an ounce of the metal (currently priced at $1,338). That’s after the Bitcoin price has tumbled recently to its current value around $10,000, half what it was worth at its all-time high last month.

Terrorists Are Increasingly Interested Bitcoin defenddemocracy.org

Read the full article here. 

How Chinese bitcoin buyers are getting around the government ban

Dagmar Frank announces the winner of W-T-W.org Women and Finance Cartoon of the Year.

Congratulations to Heinz Schwarze-Blanke for fighting corruption with “Money Laundering” Supervisory Board. On a website dedicated in part to the definition and exploration of corruption, Heinz Schwarze-Blanke’s subtle, portrayal of corruption’s insidious role in society highlights the problem with a cruel grace.

Heinz Schwarze-Blanke

Giant Leak of Offshore Financial Records Exposes Global Array of Crime and Corruption

Millions of documents show heads of state, criminals and celebrities using secret hideaways in tax havens…ICIJ

Tax-avoidance schemes are being offered up to the wealthy like vacation packages

Rosie Perper, Business Insider reports: Tax-avoidance schemes, that include creating offshore accounts in tax-free countries, are being offered to the wealthy like vacation packages. A screenshot of the TMS Group’s “International Business Company Packages” page shows several plans — called “The Indian Ocean,” “The Caribbean,” and “The Oasis” — being offered to businesses or individuals shopping around for the best place to open up an offshore account.

Two of the packages promote setting up a company in one country, then creating a business address and offshore bank account in two more countries. Seychelles and Belize are offered as possible locations for the company set-up, while Malaysia is the chosen country for business addresses.

Another site, Offshore Desk, offers an €1890 ($2,300 USD) “Seychelles Package,” allowing taxpayers of any country to incorporate a business in Seychelles and a bank account in Cyprus. Similar packages for offshore accounts in Vanuatu and Delaware, are shown on the site accompanied by flashy photos and low-cost promises.

Information obtained from the leaked Panama Papers showed offshore accounts were, in some cases, used to avoid taxes, conceal transactions, and launder money.

panamapapers.icij.org

Aljazeera’s Investigative Unit unravels a high-stakes international plot hatched by powerful Eastern European oligarchs to make millions of dollars from a crooked deal. According to one Ukrainian analyst: “It sounds like an agreement between criminal bosses. You can sign it with your blood.” The scheme involves using a web of offshore companies and international lawyers to raid US$160 million dollars under the noses of the authorities.

The money is effectively being stolen for a second time… the funds were initially frozen by Ukraine’s courts after its former president, Viktor Yanukovych, was discovered to have emptied the country’s treasury. The Oligarchs include an exiled gas billionaire guarded by Russian special forces, a Moscow property magnate and an Olympic show jumper on the run from Ukrainian authorities. The investigation shines light on the ever shifting battle between the oligarchs and global financial regulators.
Al Jazeera Investigations

By Stuttmann
www.stuttmann-karikaturen.de