“Tax havens are engaged in economic warfare against the United States…”
… Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Thursday, July 17, 2008
Arrested Banker Tells US Government Everything
Revelations in the trial of an employee of Swiss Bank UBS will have serious repercussions for the Barbados offshore banking industry. The United States government has expanded its anti-tax-evasion strategies by targeting offshore banking, and Barbados and other Caribbean banking centers are squarely in the cross-hairs.
Former UBS banker Bradley C. Birkenfeld pleaded guilty in June 2008 in a US Federal Court in Florida to charges of helping a wealthy American developer to avoid taxes on US$200 million.
But that is not all… in exchange for sentencing consideration, Birkenfeld is singing like the birds about the entire offshore banking industry, and some of his songs lead to Barbados.
Birkenfeld is charged along with Liechtenstein finance executive Mario Staggl. Here is a sample of how they worked…
Both men were accused of creating bogus trusts and sham offshore entities to hide some $20 billion in offshore assets owned by wealthy American clients. UBS is in talks with the Justice Department and Swiss authorities about turning over the names of up to 20,000 American clients.
Mr. Birkenfeld’s work concerned offshore undeclared assets held for wealthy Americans. In his statement of facts, he said that he and other unidentified UBS private bankers urged their American clients to destroy all offshore private banking records held in the United States; to use Swiss credit cards that could not be discovered by American tax authorities; and to falsely characterize money pulled out of Swiss accounts as loans from UBS. The entire business brought in $200 million a year in revenues to UBS.
Prosecutors have been shifting their focus on tax evasion to private banking practices that use undeclared offshore accounts in European tax havens…”
… from the New York Times article Former UBS Banker Pleads Guilty To Aiding Tax Evasion
US Authorities Targeting Barbados Offshore Financial Industry
Senator Carl Levin and many of his colleagues are calling for laws aimed at crippling the offshore banking industry and that is bad news for Barbados – which is mentioned time and time again as “one of those” in the stories surrounding the UBS investigation by US authorities.
The revelations of the UBS employee include the fact that his offshore bank actually trained employees in counter-surveillance, secret writing, smuggling of documents and data-encryption techniques that they used whenever they visited the United States. Birkenfeld’s testimony paints a sinister picture of the entire offshore industry – as if Barbados needed any more of this type of publicity in the United States since our country’s offshore industry was discovered to have played a major role in the Enron fraud.
The US Attack On Barbados As An Offshore Financial & Corporate Center Is Just Starting
The last time Uncle Sam targeted the offshore banking industry, Barbados was able to make all the right noises and escaped without much damage or impact. We may not be so fortunate this time.
In a post-9/11 world, the United States has been very successful in imposing it’s will upon banks and smaller countries. Under the guise of “preventing terrorist funding”, the United States has established the largest and most sophisticated financial monitoring network in history. The UBS investigation is already growing exponentially and will soon be arriving at a Barbados bank near you if it hasn’t quietly done so already.
The UBS investigation is not an end for the United States lawmakers – it is a blunt tool to be used to attack and shut down offshore centers like Barbados.
Our problem with this U.S. attack is three-fold…
1/ Our tourism industry is in trouble in large measure due to circumstances beyond our control (oil, 9/11, distance from major markets). This means an increasing reliance upon foreign exchange derived from our offshore industry.
2/ The increased foreign scrutiny of our offshore financial, banking and corporate sectors may reveal questionable operations that have previously gone unnoticed.
3/ Our country lacks the Integrity, Transparency and Accountability laws – ITAL – that provide the United States with a basic comfort level about our willingness and ability to monitor and control money laundering.
Barbados walks a thin line when it comes to maintaining the country as a profitable offshore center without attracting the wrath of our Canadian and American neighbours to the north – who only have to withdraw a few tax treaties to ruin us.
Integrity Laws In Barbados? We Don’t Have Any!
Our lack of ITAL is increasingly being noticed by the international community – and might be just the final excuse that the American law makers need to gain domestic support for curbing the Barbados offshore financial and corporate industries.
It is now six months since Prime Minister Thompson took office, and so far nothing has happened with ITAL. The Barbados government is six months past due its promise to adopt anti-corruption measures.
Don’t think that Senator Levin and his colleagues haven’t noticed.
Further Reading
Caribbean News World: Caribbean Could Suffer As US Senate Targets Offshore Banking
ABC: Senator Levin “Shut Down Swiss Bank UBS”
Canada Globe: Swiss Bankers Trained To Avoid Detection
New York Times: Former UBS Banker Pleads Guilty
Barbados Free Press 
This will come as a brutal shock to the greedy clique of Bajan real estate rapist hyenas.
Who won’t find it so easy to unload a $10 million apartment overlooking a Heywoods or Six Men’s marina if the intended $10 m are stuck in the failing U.S. bank system and can’t be legally transferred.
Xenophobe – Forget washing $10 million illegally like now.
The U.S. will intensify these current regulations.
“Transfers are subject to the Bank Secrecy Act, which tries to prevent money laundering, tax evasion, and other criminal activity. Every transaction over $10,000 is reported to a federal authority. “Suspicious” transactions are also reported. For example, if you want to avoid the $10,000 limit and you transfer $9,000 a few times within a short period of time, these transactions will be deemed “suspicious” and therefore reported.”
While Barbados has seriously tightened up as a result of US pressure over the past five years, what has the US done to assist Barbados with the FBI investigation into offshore bank accounts and money being siphoned off illegally through Dodds, Veco and 3S?
Surely it is illegal in The US for US companies or individuals to bribe foreigners and help hide the money?
*************
BFP says,
RC, I think you are missing a major point… the FBI is going to do NOTHING that will expose corruption in, or interfere with, the government of Barbados unless it is asked to do so.
According to the Alaskan and US news media, there are hundreds of thousands of pages of documents and hours and hours of conversations that form part of the FBI investigation into VECO. Seeing as how that company was doing a half a billion dollars worth of business with Barbados during the period in question, it is likely that many of those documents and financial records pertain to big-ups in Barbados.
You are NEVER going to see those documents unless Thompson asks for them… and he will NEVER do that because it is all a show. He and his DLP piggies want to feed at the trough and they can’t afford to have a vicious BLP take the reins of power 8 years from now vowing to jail the DLP like Thompson did to them.
They are all the same, you know. BLP DLP doan matta!
Of course the majority of money laundering takes place through developed countries. The two biggest cases of money laundering was Nigerian money through Zurich and Russian money through New York. And where exactly do we think the Russian money buying UK football clubs comes from in a former communist country?
No money laundering in their right mind would pick Barbados and suffer the potentially long delays and ad hoc decisions when dealing with the central bank or Ministry of International Business, helpfully now split over two separate Ministers with no clear lines of authority (*£@!)
However, the realpolitik is that rich countries have used the stick of anti-money laundering and anti-tax haven as the stick to beat off-shore centres with and there is not a great deal we can do.
But this is an opportunity as well as a threat. It should remind us that at the end of the day we cannot survive in the off-shore centre game as simply a low tax centre: either someone else we will have lower taxes than us, or we will get black listed.
However, we can adjust our offering towards a location that people want to do business for other many reasons: say regulatory and legal environment, tax and life-style choices. The good thing about developing these location factors for international business is that the corollary is investing in things that are good for locals too.
BFB is correct, ITAL is one of those things. But the biggest obstacle is the cosy closed shop that lawyers enjoy allowing them to offer poor, delayed services at very high fees. We cannot be an international business centre if that continues. But who dares open up that profession to competition. Thatcher did, will Thompson? Now that would win my respect.
Thomas Gresham is bang on. Indeed the biggest laundering is through supposed ‘legit’ operations in UK and North America.
Who do you think built Las Vegas and how much cash is placed into the system there daily?
Get real, the ‘anti-money laundering’ (which Barbados actually has specific laws against and Barbados does NOT have the secrecy laws of those Eupean jurisdictions) policies are being used to eliminate competition, by creating artifical barriers to entry in the financial world, do not mind the ‘globalisation’ rubbish that is spouted.
Globalisation simply means, ‘you buy all of ours products and become in debt to us’.
They removed the island banana industry, have made a big dent in reducing the sugar industry, working on the offshore financial sectors (so that Vermont and Delaware can benefit) and anything else is fair game!
The one consolation is that the Almighty knows all.
What one sows, one reaps.
Peace.
By the way, you are right, these efforts to repatriate business into the US will become more and more desperate, as the financial markets become under more and more pressure, to maintain unsustainable profit levels, returns and value i.e. to prevent them collapsing vis-a-vis 1939.
Things are not pretty and will not get any prettier for quite a while.
I am curious as to whether or not Barbados has really been singled out in this investigation and what exactly was said about Barbados.
I can understand the problem with Switzerland, with its extreme respect for privacy, but I don’t think Barbados would have a problem sharing information with the US authorities to help locate “hidden” assets of US citizens.
The real danger is that some of the US legislators may not know what they are talking about, and just lump Barbados into some hazy “tax haven” category.
By the way, add Nevada to the list of US states that should be grouped with the tax havens and dubious financial centres.
Sometimes I wonder what is the real agenda of BFP.
The title of your story is “Offshore Banking In Barbados And Switzerland Under Fire From United States Lawmakers”. That suggests that Barbados is the main country being investigated along with Switzerland.
Nothing could be further from the truth. I’ve scanned the US Senate Report on the topic and Barbados is not mentioned there at all, not one time. The Cayman Islands and some other Caribbean countries are mentioned but not Barbados.
The only place where Barbados is mentioned in passing is as one of the Offshore Tax havens which could be in trouble with the ongoing US posture re. tax havens is in the “Caribbean News World” story.
Your story also suggests that the Illegal Tax Avoidance methods being used by the Swiss Banks are also in Use in Barbados. Looking at your references I see no suggestion of this.
I understand your need to be sensational but you appear to be really straining to do so.
Now, I don’t think you are wrong about the possibility that Barbados, like other Caribbean Offshore Tax Havens, could be under ongoing investigation by a US body. but you have not established such a fact. You have not even interviewed some persons who might have some information in order to give a balanced viewpoint. And by som people, I don’t mean Politicians but some Lawyers and Accountants in the Offshore sector, someone from the Central Bank who could give you some details about Barbados’ tax regimes and how the Offshore sector is supposed to work. etc.
You just rush ahead with a sensational article, that on the face of it looks knowledgeable, but on further investigation spouts a number of half truths that could lead your reportedly vast overseas readership down the wrong path.
I agree that in this area ITAL is important but there are several other factors that are just as important. Re. ITAL, I think that the posturings on BOTH sides in the recent budget debate, especially the declarations of Net Worth by the Leader of the Opposition and the former Prime Minister were merely grandstanding and are not going to be of any significant value re. stamping out corruption. But, Does Switzerland have ITAL legislation? Does the US have? Does the Cayman Islands have? Is there still significant corruption in those countries?
BFP is a valuable resource to Barbados. But you will only damage us by poorly researched and holier-than-thou articles. You can do a lot better
********************
BFP says,
Ahhhhhh…… where to start?
OK… we’ll keep it really simple so you can clearly understand who is saying what about Barbados and why we should be worried.
You couldn’t find anything about Barbados and US Senate concerns? Really?
Perhaps you should “scan” a little while longer, or do a Google search for “carl levin” plus “barbados”. There are almost 3,000 returns where Senator Levin and his colleagues are concerned about Barbados as a “tax fraud and abuse haven”… to quote the Senator.
You talk about “the Senate report” not mentioning Barbados. That must be a different Senate report than those featured on Senator Levin’s website which mention Barbados – not to talk about his legislation that also mentions Barbados. Not to mention the fact that Canadian Members of Parliament are also jumping on the bandwagon and mentioning Barbados, money-laundering, tax-evasion Switzerland and Liechtenstein all in the same breath like here.
First stop though, you might try the personal website of Carl Levin… one of the most influential and powerful senior senators, and as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, our country’s big worry right now.
Senator Levin mentions Barbados frequently as a tax-haven that he wants shut down. You might trythis letter from him and then work your way forward. It only gets worse. He partnered with a fellow senator named Barack Obama to propose anti-tax haven legislation that squarely mentions and targets Barbados as a probable jurisdiction for tax fraud. That information is here.
You also might want to check with Ambassador Micheal King – our man in Washington who is extremely concerned about the impact that Senator Levin’s law will have upon our economy. That is why Ambassador King has made dozens of presentations in the last year trying prevent the damage. Google the subject yourself or just look here.
Knowing how these international schemes work, I would be extremely surprised if some of the monies involved in the investigations in Switzerland and Liechtenstein didn’t flow through Bridgetown.
Thank You America !!
==================
The OPEC minister will look you in the eyes and state:
We are at war with you infidels -have been since the embargo in the 1970s.
You are so arrogant you haven’t even recognized it!
You have more missiles, bombs, and technology; so we are fighting with the best weapon we have
and extracting (on a net basis) about $700 billion/year, out of your economy!
We will destroy you!
Death to the infidels!
—————————————-
While I am here I would like to thank you for the following:
* Not developing your 250-300 year supply of oil shale and tar sands.
We know if you did this, it would create millions of jobs for US citizens, expand your engineering capabilities,
and keep the wealth in the US instead of sending it to us to finance our war against you bastards.
* Thanks for limiting Defense Dept. purchases of oil sand from your neighbors to the north.
– We love it when you confuse your allies.
* Thanks for over-regulating every segment of your economy
and thus delaying, by decades, the development of alternative fuel technologies!
* Thanks for limiting drilling off your coasts, in Alaska , and anywhere there is a bug, bird, fish, or plant that might be inconvenienced.
Better that your people suffer! Glad to see our lobbying efforts have been so effective!
* Corn based Ethanol.
Praise Allah for this sham program!
Perhaps you will destroy yourself from the inside with theses types of policies.
This is a gift from Allah, praise his name! We never would have thought of this one!
This is better than when you pay your farmers NOT TO GROW FOOD.
Have them use more energy to create less energy, and simultaneously drive food prices through the roof!
* Thank you Democrats for controlling the U.S. Congress!!!!
* And finally, we appreciate you letting us fleece you without end.
You will be glad to know we have been accumulating shares in your banks, real estate, and publicly held companies.
We also finance a good portion of your debt and now manipulate your markets, currency, and economies to our benefit.
THANK YOU AMERICA !
————
the end cannot be far away, now.
Six of one, half dozen of another. It will get the corporate tax evaders, but not the personal ones. As for the corporate ones, they need only change the location of their head offices.
And contrary to popular belief, land prices in Barbados are likely to rise considerably as a result.
The off-shore investor need only establish residency in Barbados. Once he does that, the US, the UK, Canada, Europe it matters not – cannot touch him on his off-shore holdings.
This is a lesson that Monaco and, most notably, Switzerland, learned many decades ago and from which they have been profitting ever since. Barbados too has learned that lesson.
Therefore a citizen of another country who wants to avoid tax in that country need only not exceed the days he is allowed to stay in that country before residency is legally assumed. Usually, that is 90 days, although I understand that in Canada it is 180 days.
Barbados has already reaped a rich harvest from the new “res non-dom” regulations in the United Kingdom. Land prices in Barbados have shot up due to the demand of UK ex pats.
While this may be far from ideal for the prospective Bajan property purchaser, it certainly will not hurt the developers in Barbados and, as for the Barbados economy, well it certainly will not hurt it. What it will hurt is the possibilities of first-time home owners and, like Monaco, marinas will abound.
Anon3 – You may be right. But there again…
You’re talking about a perfect world…otherwise known as the overheated speculative economy that’s now being brought back to reality.
Today there are many – in the U.S. and Britain – who can’t afford their first home, never mind a second one on a Barbados marina.
This appeared in the Daily Mail on 15 July.
“Doldrums: The number of homes sold between April and June was the lowest since records began
House prices are falling at a rate not witnessed since records began in the 1950s, according to the latest report from banking giant Halifax.
Its figures show the price of the average home in Britain has plunged by £17,000 since January.
At the same time the monthly report from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors shows the number of homes sold between April and June was just 15.3 per estate agency – the lowest since records began thirty years ago.
Meanwhile 87 per cent of estate agents said prices had fallen over the last three months.
This is also the highest number since records began in 1978, and has risen rapidly from 56 per cent of agents at the start of the year.
One agent, from Exeter, Devon, said he was now doing deals at between 20 and 30 per cent below the peak of 2007.
An agent from York warned that, with the market in the doldrums, predatory buyers were circling to pick off the most vulnerable sellers.
‘There are sharks on the sidelines waiting to pounce on vulnerable vendors,’ he said.
Another agent, from Chesterfield, Derbyshire, said he had seen ‘an influx of predatory buyers’ and ‘savage price reductions.’
The buyers tend to be cash-rich people who are unaffected by the mortgage drought which is having such a dire impact on the property market.
They know that anybody with a ‘For Sale’ sign outside their home is struggling to find a buyer, and will be getting few, if any, viewings.
David Sherwood, from Colchester, Essex, said: ‘On the one hand, vendors are willing to accept a compromise and take an offer but opportunistic buyers are cynically dropping their offers at the point of exchange. Hardly cricket, is it?’
Jeremy Leaf, from RICS, said: ‘With demand so low, would-be-buyers are negotiating from a position of strength. Even in a weak market, there are always opportunities for investors and buyers to profit and some are starting to circle for bargains.’
But some agents are experiencing fewer inquiries from buyers than ever before.
While some buyers see today’s market as an opportunity, the majority have simply decided it is too dangerous to buy when prices are falling, or they want to buy but cannot get a loan.
One agent, from Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, said: ‘We have experienced an unprecedented six- to eight-week period of inactivity with no telephone calls, no viewings and no sales.’
But RICS said there were still a few rays of light amid the gloom – with no evidence of ‘distressed sales’, when people are forced to sell and must accept any offer which they get.
Sales are typically ‘distressed’ because the owner has been made redundant and can no longer afford the mortgage.”
The US needs to go after ITS own citizens and not where they hide their wealth. This kind of strategy has been the hallmark of US behaviour for decades. If you are having a problem at home: Go attack the country(ies) whom you deem to be the source of the problem.
A careful look @ this new issue would reveal that the problem is at home with them, their system of taxation and its associated loop-holes.
US citizens are hiding their wealth from the government to avoid US taxation. America prides itself on being the greatest capitalist country in the world, and capitalism does at times lead to greed. So, by nature of your definition of yourself, you are breeding this problem internally.
Hence,deal with the issue from within your borders. While this action may have some positive effects in Barbados as outlined earlier by posters to the forum, the overall effect will once again be that the US is demonstrating its disregard for the soverignty of other nations by interfering with the internal economic structure of the targeted nations.
Talk about “foreign policy”!
Day duz run till night catch it!
Pingback: » BBC Explains the Mechanics of Money Laundering Keltruth Corp.: News Blog of Keltruth Corp. - Miami, Florida, USA.
Let’s not be too smug about the US’s reality check on housing, food and energy prices,
We are next in line , tied as we are to the dwindling dollar.
Value is a variable perception of the purchaser, and in today’s credit market can be scarily volatile.
Any growth in modern economies requires an increased input of energy, a commodity rapidly becoming scarcer and more expensive..
If GDP doesn’t grow, the whole economic system loses its motor, and the collapse to new, more realistic, values is inevitable.
We may have had a very long, lazy day, but the evening shadows are lengthening and night is about to catch up.
All a offshore banking does is to hide money, what else ? What else????!!
Hi BFP
Have’nt had time to check the additional references you gave above but now you are making a better case even though the Michael King “article” does not really support your case imho. Btw; I noticed you changed the title of your article. Hmmmm!!
*******************
BFP says,
Yes, we thought about the point you made and decided you were correct in that regard.
that is the great thing about blogging and participatory journalism.
It is understandable, but not strictly correct to say that offshore banking is all about hiding.
Our own offshore financial sector is not protected by Swiss-like secrecy laws. Its raison d’etre is not secrecy. It is about tax efficiency, and before you guffaw and say that is code for tax evasion, let me give you a stylized story.
Imagine you are a Canadian company and you are investing in a Chinese company. If you did it directly you would pay tax twice, in Canada and China. But if you were to domicile your investment arm in Barbados the Chinese will excuse you of Chinese taxes (because we have a Barbados-Chinese double taxation treaty). If you keep the proceeds in the Barbados company and pay our 2.5% taxes, Canada will excuse you of taxes (because we have a Canada-Barbados tax treaty). But if you repatriate the funds to Canada or China you would pay taxes there. Barbados’ offshore financial sector allows companies to only pay tax once, whenever they bring it into whichever country. It is ideal for companies operating in many countries.
Ultimately, if the only advantage is tax, this is a game we cannot win. Either someone will undercut our tax advantage or we get put on a black list as an unfair tax jurisdiction. We need to compete on more than tax. Rule of law, quality and appropriateness of regulation, qualified people and life-style are other things we could credibly compete on. I am not hopeful. The Invest Barbados budget has been cut by 40% and in the 1.5 pages on international business in the 120-page budget there was no mention of earlier plans for a new financial regulatory body or a institute to teach and award locals professional (not academic) certifications in finance. Plans dropped?
xenophobe chick, I am as sure as it is possible ever to be that I am right. There is a lot of off-shore money out there and not everyone wants to live in Switzerland or Monaco. Some prefer the West Indies and of all of the West Indies, I believe Barbados has the most to offer. It is the prime choice these days. Anyway, only time will reveal who is actually right.
BFP
Great!! There are a lot of things that are good about this blog. The above was one of them. I also like your even handed treatment of the politicians. Will say more. I have to run.
“Our own offshore financial sector is not protected by Swiss-like secrecy laws”
This may be true but laws were changed in Barbados several years ago, that no longer required full disclosure of beneficial interest in shareholdings. This has been used extensively by the locals ( mainly lawyers ) in their continual shell game of hide and seek and non-disclosure.
“It is about tax efficiency”
Most foreign corporations honestly play within the rules permitted by their home jurisdiction and the respective treaties with different jurisdictions. The vast majority would not do anything to play fast and furious with the rules to avoid heavy reassessments or tax fraud. It is about tax efficiency.
Hiding money to avoid the rules seems to be predominantly played by Barbadians and the politicians. Here it is okay to flout the law because there are no real laws against blatantly stealing from the public and the few that required such as Central Bank approval are circumvented or are never enforced.
The leadership of this country has instilled a culture of graft, corruption and evasion.
Will the US authorities be asked to follow the Veco leads, assist with the FBI investigation into offshore bank accounts, and follow the source of monies siphoned via, 3S, Dodds, Cricket world, etc.?
There is no point in having a forensic audit if you don’t diligently and actively pursue the money trail offshore.
Six Men’s marina ‘a future cost’
Published on: 7/20/08.
http://www.nationnews.com/story/292196129685196.php
We were warned.
One of the reasons we need asset disclosures at some level, is that without it, every nincompoop story is given as much credence as real evidence of graft.
If you are a Barbadian trying to hide money you will not use our own offshore financial sector. Duh? If you can go off-shore, you would probably go to St Lucia, which will offer benefits in terms of no exchange controls, member of Caricom and no Barbadian authorities. There are many alternatives. If you are a foreign national trying to launder money you would not come to Barbados. You would not be fearful of the teeth of our Financial Intelligence Unit, (sic), but of the random laziness and “unpredictableness” of the bureaucrats at the central bank. This is a severe barrier to entry for bad as well as good money. Before a Lichtenstein bank employee sold his client list to the German tax authorities earlier this year, that would have been the alternative, but there are many others: the UK channel islands, Isle of Man, Gibralta, Turks and Caicos….All UK dependent territories.
Our offshore banking system is (overly) dependent on Canadian exporting firms and rich Canadians investing through a Barbados entity to give them “flexibility” on when and where they repatriate the investment proceeds and pay the (Canadian) taxman. Leading players here are Summit, Dancap, Cidel.
Our system is threatened by the US, EU and even more worryingly, Canadian legislators. But the criticisms are largely unfair and unsubstantiated. I hope our government has a strategy for responding to these threats. I am not optimistic. Yet over 60% of our corporate tax profits come from the international business sector. If that were to disappear the effect would be dramatic.
Pingback: » US Govt. - Barbados Banks Can’t Stop Drug Dealers’ Money Laundering! Keltruth Corp.: News Blog of Keltruth Corp. - Miami, Florida, USA.
Pingback: » Link Touts “tax evasion” in Barbados! Keltruth Corp.: News Blog of Keltruth Corp. - Miami, Florida, USA.