Barbados Minister of International Business Donville Inniss: Swiss Bank Account for your online porn business?

Revealed for the first time: Donville Inniss Swiss Money Connection

An interesting article in yesterday’s Nation Newspaper where Donville Inniss, our Minister of International Business, announced that Barbados is fully on board with the US and international efforts to have an automatic exchange of tax information between countries.

Some folks would say that Barbados is caving to the USA’s extortion, but others would say this is the future and welcome to it.

Of course, some folks would also question where the customers are going to come from if keeping money in Barbados is the same as having a bank account in Chicago or London. Why should anyone do their banking in Bim if there is no advantage?

“. . . My ministry has written to the secretary general of the OECD in Paris indicating that Barbados has formally committed to signing on to the automatic exchange of tax information,” Inniss said. “This is important because as a government there is somewhat of a paradigm shift in taking a position that Barbados needs to be a player, and to be seen as a major player in this international financial services sector where it matters most.”

… Nation News Bowing to Global Pressure

What about all Donville’s porn profits?

This concern with international tax treaties is a newish thing for Pornville, er, Donville.

You see, not so many years ago, Barbados Free Press caught out Donville Inniss in the act of profiteering from online pornography.

“One of the saddest things I’ve ever seen is Orgasm.com’s pregnant woman porn section. How does Donville Inniss feel about these desperate young girls – making money for him like this?” 

Banking executive from CIBC’s FirstCaribbean International Bank carried FIFA bribe!

Why would a CIBC FirstCaribbean International Bank executive travel from the Bahamas to New York to personally pick up a US$250,000 cheque?

Why not just wire the funds? Why not send the cheque via courier?

The answer appears to be that the US$250,000 was being money-laundered by one of FIFA’s top officials, Chuck Blazer. After picking up the cheque in New York, the banking executive returned to the Bahamas and deposited the cheque into Blazer’s personal offshore account.

I didn’t really catch onto this at first. I thought it was a situation where the CIBC had been unknowningly duped or had a client misuse the bank. But that isn’t what happened according to the articles in the press – the CIBC FirstCaribbean International Bank was directly and knowingly involved in money-laundering.

Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Anyone who has seen the award-winning documentary about the 2008 meltdown – Inside Job – knows that the banks are rotten to the core, and in conjunction with bribed elected and appointed officials ensure that the motto of the inside crowd remains “Profits are private. Losses are public.”

Closer to home just look at Clico and the Barbados DLP government.

But for you and me though, just miss a mortgage payment or don’t pay taxes and see what happens. Wuhloss!

FIFA scandal exacerbates Canadian banks’ Caribbean troubles

An eyebrow-raising disclosure in the U.S. indictment of FIFA officials is that a representative of a Caribbean bank made it easy for one allegedly illegal transaction to be done by flying to New York to personally collect a check and then returned to deposit it in an account in the Bahamas.

This unusual courier service, which reduced the electronic trail on a $250,000 payment to former FIFA official Chuck Blazer in May 2011, was provided by an unnamed officer of Barbados-based CIBC FirstCaribbean International Bank, the indictment shows. CIBC FirstCaribbean is a subsidiary of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Canada’s fifth-largest bank.

That cheque, U.S. prosecutors allege, was part of a $10 million bribe paid in return for the votes of then FIFA vice president Jack Warner, Blazer and another FIFA official in support of South Africa being granted the rights to host the 2010 World Cup.  

Barbados offshore banking: meet rock and hard place…

submitted by Blackman

Few working class Bajans really understand the connection between our offshore banking / corporate industry and high quality tourism visitors. The downturn of mass tourism (or tourism for the masses, including cruise ship spend per passenger) is only a part of the story.

Another segment of our long-stay, high spend per visitor tourism industry is under assault because of international (primarily American) pressure to report our offshore banking clients to foreign governments.

It looks like the Barbados government is rolling over on this issue, but to be fair, what else can we do? Barbados: meet rock and hard place…

Barbados Eyes Inter-Governmental Agreement With US on FATCA

Barbados has signaled its intention to the United States of concluding a reciprocal Inter-Governmental Agreement to apply to the US’ Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, Prime Minister Freundel Stuart said Thursday.

The Prime Minister said Barbados was “aware that an atmosphere of certainty was needed for domestic and international operators in our banking sector and other entities which met the criteria of foreign financial institutions under FATCA to thrive.”

“I look forward, therefore, to being able in the coming weeks to announce formally that the US is favourably disposed to negotiating a reciprocal Model 1 inter-governmental agreement with us,” he said. “And from our end, we will be working towards concluding agreement by year-end.”

The law requires the automatic exchange of US taxpayers’ foreign banking information. That places it in the same policy space as exchanges under the OECD, he said. 

More UK government attacks on Global Tax Avoidance and Income Shifting

Barbados had better develop some new revenue streams… like yesterday!

submitted by Not Taken

Luxembourg / Barbados / Marshall Islands – tax avoidance and income shifting is all the same shell game but it’s becoming more difficult to hide due to computers and the communication and lobbying powers of the internet.

The Brits are out to stop the game. Canada (CRA) and US (IRS) are cracking down. Barbados is very exposed. Our Government should be prepared to see its revenue from offshore businesses to decline substantially. The billion of new Treasury Bill funding to pay its bills will disappear quickly.

And at the same time as our offshore banking and companies hosting industries are coming under pressure, our tourism seems to be in a death spiral.

Many of us foresaw this situation coming ten years ago. Only fools couldn’t see it coming five years ago.

So far I’ve heard nothing from either the DLP or the BLP except excuses and criticism without solutions capable of addressing this crisis. This is not a time for gentle, incremental solutions: it is a time for radical changes, not more of the same.

Have a look at this from a Canadian newspaper…

Amazon’s U.K. unit slammed for ‘pathetic’ $3.7-million tax bill

Amazon.com Inc.’s main U.K. unit paid $3.7-million (U.S.) of taxes on its 2012 income, it said on Wednesday, despite group UK sales of $6.5-billion, prompting criticism from lawmakers and competitors.

Amazon.co.uk Ltd. added in its accounts, published through the U.K. companies register, that it received £2.5-million ($3.8-million U.S.) in government grants during 2012 – just ahead of the £2.4-million it paid in corporation tax, the U.K. form of corporate income tax.

Corporate tax avoidance has risen to the top of the political agenda in Europe following revelations in the past couple of years about how little big names like Apple Inc., Starbucks, Google and Microsoft pay in tax in markets where they reap billions of dollars in sales.

The companies say they follow the rules but U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron has called for international action on the shifting of profits, which can help firms cut tax bills.

Tax Havens under fire in massive new leak of hidden offshore accounts

Washing money, Hiding money

contributed by “M”

Unlike the mainstream media in Barbados which seems disinclined to report on the financial shenanigans of its politicians/public figures (except the $75,000.00 cheque), the media in Canada has no such hesitation, as seen at the attached link to CBC website.  Other major media in Canada are running with the story. While 38 media outlets around the world are probing the data leaks reported in the material reported in Canada by CBC, I do not expect to read about it in the Barbados papers.

Canadian CBC: Senator’s husband put $1.7M in offshore tax havens

Canadian CBC: 450 Canadians in offshore leak

Yahoo! Finance: Report exposes secrets of offshore tax havens

While Barbados does not figure prominently in this and related CBC articles, I think Barbados authorities should be concerned.

Barbados is the third largest recipient of Canadian outward Foreign Direct Investment, after the USA and the UK; with the principal industry being “financial services”, which I expect is mainly in “offshore” accounts. Canadians are believed to to be the largest depositors in Barbados offshore bank accounts.

It may well be the case that all of those a legal.

Notwithstanding, with the spotlight being shone on the issue of  “offshore accounts” and “tax havens”, and Canadian Finance Minister Jim Flaherty’s pledge in last week’s budget the government will bolster its efforts to fight offshore tax evasion, including launching a new whistleblower line that pays rewards for tips, improving compliance programs and demanding more information on certain financial transactions; it seems likely that some Canadians “investors” will choose to repatriate their foreign direct investments to Canada rather than face the scrutiny for Canada Revenue Agency

Not Taken

Patrick R. Hoyos: Poor Barbados justice system frightens away foreign investors

“Where is the justice?”

Editor’s comment: This article by Patrick Hoyos brilliantly explains what is probably one of the most destructive forces in our society and economy – the inability of our justice system (for a variety of reasons) to deliver justice. Bajans have long known that our highly politicized and under-funded justice system cannot be relied upon, and that “Rule of Law” in Barbados means that those in positions of power can change or ignore the rules and the law without accountability.

The big problem for the elites is that with the advent of the internet, Barbados lost the power to control information. Thus, foreign investors and people who might be thinking about doing business in Barbados now know that business disputes typically take decades to resolve before the Barbados courts. Smart money runs from doing business in such a jurisdiction.

Increasingly international investors and companies are happy to have their money flow through Barbados to other jurisdictions – but invest or do business here? Leave the money here? Now that’s something else.

We’ve reprinted Patrick’s article here in full, lest someone pressure him to remove it from his own website, but we ask you to read the full article at The Broad Street Journal. If you live, do business or invest in Barbados, you’ll soon find yourself visiting The Broad Street Journal on a daily basis and eagerly anticipating the next article.

A bridge too far

By Patrick R. Hoyos    Published May 24, 2011

It is now three months since I wrote in this space about The Tribunal That Won’t Deliver its Judgment.

Three months since I noted that, despite having to wait three years after winning their case in court to have hearings before the Severance Payments Tribunal to determine the “quantum of severance,” and nearly a year since those hearings had ended, no judgement had yet been delivered.

Three months since I pointed out the frustration felt by all of the plaintiffs that justice for them seemed only to exist on paper but could not find its way into coin of the realm.

Three months since I pointed out that one of the plaintiffs had died without receiving his settlement.

I asked then, “Where is the justice?”

UK helps Barbados with damage control over tax transparency failure

International Community wants action, not promises

A new Barbados Government press release says that the United Kingdom will upgrade our country’s status with respect to the UK’s legislation on offshore non-compliance by U.K taxpayers, and petition the OECD to reconsider its recent report about Barbados that resulted in “highly prejudicial consequences”.

Last January the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) slapped Barbados upside the head for failing to comply with international standards for sharing tax information. The OECD review was part of a crackdown on money laundering and tax havens and found that Barbados “did not have legislation in place to fully share information on tax matters with international partners.”

See BFP’s January 28, 2011 article OECD: Barbados fails tax transparency standards

Barbados was once again sent to our room by the international community until we could behave ourselves and pass some laws and regulations like we agreed to do years ago but never got around to. So now that we’ve taken a few weeks and passed the new laws we’d like to come out and play with the others, and the UK is going to vouch for us.

This same scenario plays out once or twice a year in one form or another when the international community gets tired of all promises and no action. Last year Barbados was downgraded to a spot below Cambodia over our failure to fight human trafficking. This year it’s our failure to comply with international tax information standards. Next year it will be something else.

Laws? Standards? What you talking about?

You see, we Barbadians don’t like to pass laws or comply with outside standards. We like to make promises and statements of intent, but actually passing laws is another thing. Laws make it inconvenient for the ruling class to do whatever they want. That’s why the DLP won’t pass their promised Integrity Legislation and Freedom of Information laws.

Unfortunately, while we Bajans understand our leaders making promises and then doing the opposite, the international community is less forgiving than the voters.

Moral of the story: After the OECD slapped us around, it took our government about two weeks to pass the required laws because the downgrade threatened our economy.

Too bad our government won’t act so quickly to pass Integrity Legislation,  Freedom of Information and Conflicts of Interest laws. Or Environmental Legislation.

Prime Minister Stuart could make those laws happen if he wanted to.

But he doesn’t want to.

Barbados Government Press Release Damage Control

British Government believes OECD Global Forum should review Barbados tax information-exchange finding as soon as possible

OECD: Barbados fails tax transparency standards

Review part of crackdown on money laundering & tax havens

Measures on tax transparency in Barbados still do not meet international standards, according to The Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes, hosted by the The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

“In studies of 10 countries released on Thursday, it found that Barbados, the Seychelles, San Marino and Trinidad and Tobago did not have legislation in place to fully share information on tax matters with international partners.”

Reuters Africa story: Barbados, San Marino, others still not tax transparent

Further Reading

OECD Global Forum on Transparency

January 27, 2011 Information Brief (PDF)

Wikileaks to soon put Caribbean Money Laundering Laws to the test

Cayman bank account info to go on WikiLeaks as CARICOM announces Anti-Money Laundering Deal

“Stopping money laundering in Barbados would be like cutting our own throats.”

Two money laundering news items arrived in our in-basket today from different sources, and when we put them together we thought, “Hey, synchronicity!” See? I was awake in school at least on one day. (Actually, I was awake most days because I didn’t want to get a stick across the knuckles from Mr. W.)

Thanks to one of our old friends in Manitoba Canada (brrrrrr!!!!! Youbee, come on home for February!) we know that Swiss whistleblower Rudolf Elmer is going to hand over bank data to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on 2000 people who have money parked offshore in the Caymans.

Barbadian Politicians on the list? …

Bajans on stolen list of secret Swiss bank accounts? The HSBC Private Bank scandal.

UPDATED: February 28, 2011 – Tremendous interest in this article by Bajans

Swiss Regulator “symbolically” reprimands HSBC over data theft.

Barbados Government continues to ignore HSBC Private Bank Money Laundering & Tax Haven Scandal

We are again seeing tremendous interest in this Barbados Free Press article with thousands of hits coming from all over the world. It turns out that the Swiss financial regulator has just taken a piece out of the HSBC hide – well, at least made a “symbolic” reprimand according to the news.

But it’s really all for show folks. Some of the laundered money came through Barbados, but no investigations or prosecutions will be done by Barbados. Too right!

First Update: October 2, 2010…

As the workweek winds down, Friday is usually a slower day at Barbados Free Press in terms of visitors. That didn’t seem to matter yesterday though when almost 5,000 Barbadians took the time to click upon and read this article fully – showing the tremendous interest that voters still have in knowing where their money went over the last 20 years.

During the 2007 election campaign and continuing for the first 3 months after winning, the DLP and David Thompson promised to address the issue of BLP government corruption and offshore money transfers by BLP government officials and friends. That promise died about April of 2008 and became a total non-subject by 2009 as the DLP piggies at the trough decided that they had better not throw any stones while living in glass houses themselves.

The high Bajan readership on this article shows that voters haven’t forgotten the issue of their tax dollars spirited away to offshore accounts.

A little bit of HSBC information released before the next election could be an important event in Bajan politics, given what the mood of the public will be after a few more years of financial downturn and unemployment.

Here’s our original article that is drawing so much interest from people living in Barbados…

Rogue employee exposes 80,000+ HSBC Private Bank clients. How many from Barbados?

A list of 80,000+ foreign client Swiss bank accounts is in the hands of the French government – who are sharing the take with tax authorities in other countries. It appears that 99% of the offshore accounts are unreported to the clients’ home countries.

“There were 8,000 accounts on the list that belonged to French citizens, and only two accounts had been declared for tax purposes.” *

“More than 1,700 private offshore bank accounts belonging to Canadians turned up on a list of secret accounts in Switzerland.” *

In 2006, Herve Falciani, head of computer security at HSBC, started downloading (read “stealing”) the detailed data of 80,000 foreign clients of HSBC’s Private Bank in Geneva, Switzerland. These are serious accounts that take at least US$500,000 to open, but that’s the lowest.

“We’re talking billions of dollars held in secret Swiss accounts – and you know that some of that must have come through Bridgetown.”

Sir Allen Stanford says “Just call me Al”

Caribbean Knighthoods: Easy come, easy go!

Until we came across the story at Trivester.com, somehow we missed reports in the oldstream news media that the Antigua & Barbuda government finally yanked Sir Allen Stanford’s bought-and-paid-for Knighthood. You know how it works: Stanford gave money to the politicians and they gave him the “Sir” title until their association with Stanford became a little too hot to handle.

Sir Allen, er, “Al” is in a spot of trouble over running his banks and businesses like a big Ponzi scheme – which was all fine and good for a little while but like any Ponzi scheme had to collapse eventually. But what parties he had while it was in the growth cycle!

Much like the executives involved in the CL Financial – CLICO ponzi schemes where 76 billion dollars or thereabouts disappeared overnight. What parties they had, what jets, cars, women and mansions! Oh well – not so bad for Leroy Parris who was awarded a golden Caribbean Broadcasting parachute by his old buddy and lawyer, Prime Minister David Thompson.

Anyway, back to SIR Allen, um, “Al”…

“Al” will be going on a little vacation for a few years. Hopefully before his banks collapsed “Al” remembered to pay off all the drug dealers he was money-laundering for because the cocaine cartels lack a sense of humour in certain matters. Nope, I wouldn’t want to be “Sir Al” in any jail in the world if I lost drug money.

So ends the party for SIR Allen – a guy who purchased his title just a surely as he bought suits and ties. Of course, for Al to make the purchase, there had to be a seller – and there are no shortages of Knighthood sellers ’bout hey.

Oh yes, how we little Caribbean islands love to hand out Knighthoods like candy to friends and political supporters – half the time while ignoring or disparaging the British Monarchy upon whose credibility the whole thing rests.

Visit our friends over at Trivester.com for all the details about “Al” and his little problem: Sir Allen Stanford’s Knighthood Revoked

We’ve also added Trivester.com to our sidebar links and we’d appreciate some feedback on this from our readers. Thanks!

United States IRS to expand Barbados office and others. Looking out for American tax cheats

Welcome to the new world where Barbados is forced to allow increased numbers of American IRS tax investigators to work and investigate freely on our island.

Just because the US says so.

Our government can’t say “no” because you know what would happen.

Well, that’s what President Obama promised he would do if elected, and he’s done it. Hmmmmm… at least there’s one politician who keeps election promises!

Too bad it isn’t our Prime Minister.

IRS to Add Staff to Barbados Office

CaribWorldNews, NEW YORK, NY, Thurs. Oct. 15, 2009: As the Internal Revenue Service steps up its focus on tax cheats in overseas countries, the agency yesterday said it will boost staff in its Barbados office.

As part of its efforts to step up monitoring of Americans with off-shore accounts who avoid paying their taxes, the IRS said it intends to hire more than 800 new employees in the next year and add staff to eight existing overseas offices, including Barbados.

Meanwhile, with the deadline looming today for Americans with overseas accounts to reveal them to the IRS, Commissioner Douglas Shulman on Wednesday said over 7,500 Americans have come forward so far, revealing accounts ranging in value from $10,000 to more than $100 million in the Caribbean and several other regions including Antartica.

… read the full article at CaribWorldNews.com

Barbados Supervisor Of Insurance Announces $2,500 Voluntary Fine For Infractions… That Should Stop Multi-Million Dollar Insurance Frauds Like CLICO!

Prior to being appointed to his regulatory position, (Barbados Supervisor of Insurance) Carlos Belgrave was the General Manager of a local company that manufactures “flour, animal and poultry feeds” … from OffshoreAlert’s 2006 “Worst Regulator” Award

Carlos Belgrave, Former Chicken Feed Manager, Sets The Standard For Barbados Insurance Industry

The recent collapse of the CLICO insurance company exposed the fact that successive Barbados governments have allowed insurance companies and offshore corporations to pretty much do as they please so long as those political campaign donations, kickbacks and business jet rides keep rolling in.

But now that the world’s attention has come to focus upon our failings, Barbados decided to make some noises so investors and other governments will believe we’ve taken effective measures to supervise our offshore insurance industry. The key here is that we haven’t taken any new steps… we just make noises and promises so others will be taken in and believe that things have changed in Barbados.

The sham press conference by Barbados Supervisor of Insurance was all about repairing investor confidence after the CLICO debacle – not about real change to protect investors & policy holders

To kick things off, our Supervisor of Insurance held a press conference (Nation News article) announcing that the General Insurance Association of Barbados (GIAB) members have agreed to some voluntary standards that may be enforced by a $2,500 fine. It is hoped that maybe, sometime in the future, these voluntary standards might possibly become law in Barbados. Maybe. If. Sometime.

Judging by the accounts in the local news rags, the revelations at the press conference were shocking – but true to form the Barbados media spun an outrageous admission of incompetence, guilt and amateurism into a positive story. In truth, the Barbados Supervisor of Insurance admitted that Barbados lacks effective standards in law respecting the financial health, financial management and financial strength of insurance companies. (Barbados Advocate coverage of press conference here)

CLICO investors and policy holders probably thought we had such standards as laws – but they thought wrong.

But hey, we’re going to put those laws in place. Someday, maybe, if… but for now the Barbados insurance companies promise to volunteer to maintain those standards or risk having to pay (again voluntarily) a whopping BDS$2,500 (US$1,250) fine. Wow! That should prevent another CLICO-type collapse, don’t you think?

Our lack of rules, laws or effective oversight is what allowed a healthy insurance company like CLICO Barbados to “invest” in huge loans to parent company CL Financial and other Clico companies – loans that were secured by way-overvalued swampland in Florida. Loans secured by deals where executives of CLICO-associated companies took secret commissions and kickbacks for engineering the over-payment for swampland!

See our articles about the CLICO fraud…

CL Financial, CLICO Fraud Report: Dummy Company, Phantom “Consultancy” Payments, Vanishing Money Transfers From Company To Company

EXCLUSIVE REPORT BY BARBADOS FREE PRESS: CL Financial Group Collapse – Insiders Took Bribes To Have Company Purchase Land For More Than Market Value!

One of many: A US$3 Million Florida mansion belonging to CL Financial Director - Thanks for the bailout, Prime Minister Thompson!

Meanwhile, the Directors of CL Financial were purchasing millions of dollars of prime, upscale Florida waterfront mansions for their own enjoyment and profit.

That is the legacy of two successive Barbados governments and our Supervisor of Insurance, Carlos Belgrave.

Now Belgrave says he wants to make a law requiring minimum capital standards for insurance companies. Hopefully Belgrave no longer accepts “bearer peat certificates” as security for capital! Such standards saw Belgrave named in 2006 as the “worst regulator” by Offshore Alert.

The CLICO Chicken Came Home To Roost

A Chicken Named CLICO

In the case of CLICO, the Barbados insurance company was allowed to operate for years without sufficient cash reserves – and no one thought it dangerous when a otherwise healthy CLICO loaned all kinds of money to its parent company to purchase swampland in Florida at a price that greatly exceeded the real value of the land!

Not to be outdone by the previous BLP Government for looking after friends and concealing the truth from the public, current Prime Minister David Thompson has pledged millions of your tax dollars to assist collapsed CLICO. Oh… did you know that the Prime Minister and CLICO CEO Leroy Parris are godfathers to each other’s child? Did you know that CLICO contributed to the DLP election campaign and that David Thompson borrowed CLICO’s business jet?

All a coincidence I’m sure as the Prime Minister works diligently to socialize Clico’s losses with our tax dollars.

You know the drill for the Prime Minister’s friends: Profits are private, but losses are paid for with your public tax dollars!

Barbados Supervisor Of Insurance Carlos Belgrave Approved US$ Half A Billion Insurance Assets That Were “Bearer Peat Certificates” !

Instead of pulling Reliant’s license and despite there being no change of control or management, Belgrave allowed Reliant to continue in business by approving replacement capital with a face value of $518 million that consisted of nothing more substantial than a loan note issued by a newly-formed Panama firm that was secured by “bearer peat certificates representing the right to obtain peat, a pre-coal state organic material used as energy or for horticultural use, from the Changuinola Peat Deposit of Northwestern Panama”…

… quoted from Offshore Alert in the BFP Article: Carlos Belgrave, Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions in Barbados, Called “Worst Regulator” By OffshoreAlert

New York Times Editorial Reflects Growing US Assault On Offshore Banking – What Should Barbados Do?

The Swiss and Their Secrets

A New York Times editorial is calling upon the United States government to reject any deal with Switzerland that would let 52,000 American citizens off the hook for having unreported Swiss bank accounts. This “get tough” attitude is reflected in many American media articles and mirrors the long-standing position of President Obama — who sponsored anti-offshore banking legislation long before he became president.

Barbados government officials have always talked a good game when it comes to transparency, accountability and monitoring of Barbados offshore corporations and international banks, but increasingly the United States is calling upon foreign governments like Barbados to open their records for US inspection — which of course destroys much of the attraction of offshore financial centers.

As economies come under increasing pressure there will be more calls to rein in offshore financial centers from real or imagined misdeeds as the developed nations fight to retain their tax base.

What Can Barbados Do To Avoid The Wrath Of Developed Countries?

As we have pointed out from the day we published our first article over three years ago, Barbados does not have any integrity legislation, transparency laws or conflicts of interest regulations. Barbados corporations are routinely allowed to violate existing laws regarding records keeping and public accountability, and the government itself is one of the worst violators of corporate reporting laws for companies in which it has an interest.

All of this sends the wrong signals to the United States, Canada and other countries that have expressed concern over our offshore financial and corporate industries. It is a shame that the DLP and David Thompson lied about their promise to implement ITAL – Integrity, Transparency and Accountability Legislation.

As Switzerland is discovering, chickens do come home to roost when it is most inconvenient.

Further Reading

NYT: The Swiss and Their Secrets

Consultant Hired To Take Barbados Stock Exchange International – But If The Chief Justice & Others Don’t Have To Obey Our Financial Laws, What Message Does That Send To The World?

Barbados has hired a Canadian company to transform the Barbados Stock Exchange into an international exchange. This might be possible because, unlike so many small islands, Barbados has so far escaped some of the huge public scandals that call attention to the lack of standards and contempt for the rule of law that is endemic in offshore financial centers.

Escaped so far, anyway.

One has to wonder though, if Barbados international reputation is more a result of luck, hype and spin than a reflection of reality. Successive Barbados governments, including the current DLP Thompson government, have refused to pass any laws relating to integrity, conflicts of interest, accountability and freedom of information.

Laws regarding records keeping by businesses — even public companies — are all but ignored on this island. Even the Chief Justice, Sir David Simmons, has been caught out in a corporate scandal where business records disappeared or never existed.

Prime Minister David Thompson is likewise caught up in a scandal over the lack of financial records and failure to file records by CLICO when he acted as their lawyer for years. Oh, and coincidentally, Prime Minister Thompson just gave CLICO 10s of millions of dollars in guarantees, concessions and cold hard cash. Oh, did we also mention that Prime Minister Thompson and CLICO CEO Leroy Parris are godfathers to each other’s children?

Same old, same old ’bout hey!

Some day all these chickens gots to come home to roost, and when it happens Prime Minister Thompson and Chief Justice Simmons will say, “Barbados is acting to put in place additional oversight in our financial and corporate sectors. The government will soon introduce integrity legislation…”

Same old, same old ’bout hey!

Thompson’s plan for his friends: Privatize Profits, Socialize Losses

A great article at Keltruth: $10M for Clico Fund – Privatize Profits, Socialize Losses

Carlos Belgrave, Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions in Barbados, Called “Worst Regulator” By OffshoreAlert

Prior to being appointed to his regulatory position, (Barbados Supervisor of Insurance) Carlos Belgrave was the General Manager of a local company that manufactures “flour, animal and poultry feeds”

… from OffshoreAlert’s 2006 “Worst Regulator” Award

IMF Says Barbados Insurance Sector Needs “Tighter Regulation” – No Kidding!

The chaos surrounding the Barbados financial and insurance company called CLICO is in full swing so the International Monetary Fund – IMF – feels obliged to tell us that our insurance industry needs “tighter regulation”. (Hey, thanks for the tip IMF! We’d have never known without you.) Next the IMF will be telling us to take a closer look at Sir Allen Stanford.

Perhaps if the IMF staff could have torn themselves away from their duck pate and champagne back in 2007 they would have seen that Carlos Belgrave, Barbados Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions, was named “Worst Regulator” by OffshoreAlert.

Apparently OffshoreAlert was most impressed by Belgrave’s staunch support of three Barbados insurance companies that faked their books and had owners previously convicted of fraud. Not to mention that Belgrave approved and licensed the companies when other countries had turned them down.

IMF Report Talks Of Potential For Bank Failure In Barbados?

Our friends over at Barbados Money Laundering Advisory have published an excellent article about the IMF and Offshore Alert reports AND they seem to think that the IMF report also talks about another potential failure of a Barbados bank. Scary times we are living in.

Hello KYC & OffshoreAlert!

KYC – Know Your Client – is an investigative organisation dedicated to exposing financial crime wherever it is found. OffshoreAlert! is one of its newsletters. The organisation is run by journalist David Marchant out of Miami, Florida. Marchant has an impressive track record and was even kicked out of Bermuda by the government of the day in retaliation for his work. Somehow, I don’t think that Mr. Marchant would be made too welcome by the Barbados government either!

We’ve made a decision to publish a part of Mr. Marchant’s work to illustrate to our readers just how capable and fearless he is. We also think that this little sample will convince many people of the value of subscribing to OffshoreAlert! and of attending their next conference in Miami Beach, Florida this April. (As a side-note to Mr. Marchant, if you have any problem with us publishing this excerpt, please email us. Thanks!)

Here’s what OffshoreAlert discovered in 2006 about Chris Belgrave – Barbados Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions…

OffshoreAlert Awards – Best & Worst of 2006

KYC News, Inc., January 7, 2007

Worst Regulator
Carlos Belgrave, Supervisor of Insurance and Pensions, in Barbados

OffshoreAlert had occasion to investigate three Barbados insurers in 2006, namely Strategy Insurance Limited, Reliant Insurance SCC and River Reinsurance Limited. The first two are part of a Canada-based group whose insiders have included three people convicted of fraud-related offenses, while the third, which has a business relationship with the Canada group, is partly-owned by two Bermuda-based businessmen who are currently under investigation for securities fraud in the United States and only sought an insurance license in Barbados after being turned down in Bermuda. If all that was not warning enough for Belgrave, Strategy Insurance Limited’s parent, which trades as a penny stock in the United States, disclosed that the insurer had been carrying 104 million of non-existent capital on its books for 11 months. The capital had once existed, according to the firm, but it was allegedly illegally transferred out of the company by unnamed shareholders, rendering the entire group insolvent.

Instead of pulling Reliant’s license and despite there being no change of control or management, Belgrave allowed Reliant to continue in business by approving replacement capital with a face value of $518 million that consisted of nothing more substantial than a loan note issued by a newly-formed Panama firm that was secured by “bearer peat certificates representing the right to obtain peat, a pre-coal state organic material used as energy or for horticultural use, from the Changuinola Peat Deposit of Northwestern Panama”.

When OffshoreAlert contacted Belgrave, he farcically claimed that he was legally prohibited from even having a general discussion about the Barbados Insurance Act, let commenting on individual companies. Belgrave declined to impart any information about his professional background and qualifications so we did our own research and found that, prior to being appointed to his regulatory position, Belgrave was the General Manager of a local company that manufactures “flour, animal and poultry feeds”, according to its promotional material. When we found out that Belgrave is currently the ‘Third Vice-President’ of the U.S.-based International Association of Insurance Fraud Agencies Inc., we didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Further Reading

Barbados Money Laundering Advisory: Bajan Banks and Insurance Companies Inadequately Supervised

KYC News – Offshore Alert: Website Link

President Obama and America Getting Tough With Tax Cheats

Apparently, President Obama has imposed tough new requirements on his officials and cabinet members: They must pay taxes.

This onerous rule has already sidelined or slandered a number of candidates or appointees for his critical posts. Many wonder if such strictures are a wise move, but it’s hard to quarrel when their jobs are about spending trillions of taxpayer dollars – a cause that some of these people have not made a contribution toward.

… Diane Francis in The National Post article US Protectionism Globally Destructive

US Protectionism Likely To Rise

Times are tough everywhere, but nowhere are they tougher than in the wallet of the United States of America where taxpayers are now on the hook for a trillion dollar giveaway to corporations in what is euphemistically called “a bailout”.

That money has to come from somewhere and one of the first messages sent out by President Obama is that all Americans and American businesses will pay their fair share of taxes. The Obama administration must, and will, stop the secret foreign economy conducted offshore by Americans who continue to live in the homeland but keep their assets and income hidden offshore.

The second message of the Obama Presidency is that America intends to stop being the world’s policeman and better look after things at home. While the world breathes a sigh of relief that the American bully cop will be seen less, the other side of the coin is an increase in trade protectionism. As the USA withdraws into a “look after the homeland” mode, smaller countries that don’t matter a whole lot to the United States (like Barbados) will find their offshore financial industries under increasing scrutiny.

Like the vast majority of people in Barbados, we at BFP supported (at least moral support) Obama’s bid for President. But we also understood that Obama will be no special friend to foreign nations, at least not at the expense of the United States. As we wrote in several articles, Senator Obama was a fierce opponent of the offshore banking industry in the Caribbean and he even sponsored several pieces of legislation that were directly harmful to Barbados.

So enjoy the moral victory and social progress represented by the election of a non-old-white-guy President, but hang on to your wallets friends because money is going to get tighter ’bout hey.

Breaking: Swiss Bank UBS Closing 19,000 Hidden Offshore Accounts Of American Clients – What About Barbados’ Offshore Banking Industry?

Caribbean Offshore Financial Centers Next?

The Swiss bank UBS is closing 19,000 previously-secret offshore bank accounts owned by American clients after being targeted by the United States government that is determined to stop all tax fraud through offshore banking centers.

Offshore banking centers like Barbados.

This is huge my friends. Huge.

And no, President Obama is NOT going to go easy on good old Barbados just because we are a majority black small island nation. As we already pointed out long ago, Barack Obama has been a leader in calling for the shutting down of offshore financial centers like Barbados.

Further  Reading

BFP: President Barack Obama Would Destroy Barbados Offshore Banking Industry – He Said So!

Reuters…

UPDATE 1-UBS closing U.S. clients’ offshore accounts

(Recasts with UBS confirmation, adds background)

By Lisa Jucca

ZURICH, Jan 9 (Reuters) – Swiss wealth manager UBS AG (UBSN.VX: Quote, Profile, Research) (UBS.N: Quote, Profile, Research) is closing all the offshore accounts of its U.S. clients, the bank said on Friday, as it comes under pressure from U.S. tax authorities.

The Swiss bank decided in July last year to stop offering offshore accounts to U.S. citizens after it was targeted by a U.S. tax investigation which challenges Switzerland’s famous banking secrecy laws.

U.S. prosecutors have alleged UBS helped clients hide $18 billion of untaxed American money in undeclared accounts. This amounts to around $300 million of annual unpaid taxes, the newspaper said.

UBS spokesman Serge Steiner said the decision to close offshore accounts for U.S. domiciled clients was taken in November 2007. The bank started last year to close cash accounts of U.S. clients holding less than 50,000 Swiss francs ($45,660), he added.

“This is an ongoing process. It started last year and accelerated since last summer,” Steiner said, confirming a New York Times report. As part of the investigation, U.S. authorities indicted UBS’s wealth management chief last year.

UBS, which U.S. authorities say helped wealthy Americans hide cash in offshore bank accounts, will shut about 19,000 offshore accounts, the paper said, quoting unnamed U.S. clients.

Continued…