ICIJ's Secrecy for Sale digital newsbook

The International Consortium Of Investigative Journalists

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e y r l D I G I T A L N E W SB O O K FORSecec Sa Inside the Global Offshore Money Maze The International Consortium THE CENTER FOR of Investigative Journalists PUBLIC INTEGRITY SHOW CONTENTS v Secrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 2 Table of Contents 4 Introduction: Secret Files 71 Offshore Companies Provide Expose Offshore’s Global Link Between Corporate Impact Mogul and Azerbaijan’s President 17 Caribbean Go-Between Provided Shelter for Far-Away 77 François Hollande’s Frauds, Documents Show Campaign Treasurer’s Investments in the Cayman 31 Lawyers and Accountants Islands Help Rich Manage Their Money 81 ‘Crony’ of African Strongman Among Thai Names in Secret 40 Faux Corporate Directors Offshore Files Stand in for Fraudsters, Despots and Spies 88 Mega-Rich Use Tax Havens to Buy and Sell Masterpieces 47 Ferdinand Marcos’ Daughter Tied to Offshore Trust in 95 Elites Undermine Putin Rail Caribbean Against Tax Havens 55 Taxmen Have Little Clue of 99 Ponzi Scheme Used Offshore Offshore Companies Owned Hideaways to Shuffle by Greeks Investors’ Money 64 Disclosure of Secret Offshore 106 Deutsche Bank Helped Documents May Force Top Customers Maintain Mongolian Lawmaker to Resign Hundreds of Offshore Entities 66 Canadian Senator’s Husband Shifted Money Into Offshore 108 French Banks Traded in Tax Havens Secrecy Go online for more about the ICIJ’s investigation into offshore secrecy including videos and related stories at: www.

Informations

• Publié par: Nan0
• Publié le: 13 mai 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 78
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

D I G I T A L N E W SB O O K
FORSecec Sa
Inside the Global
Offshore Money Maze
The International Consortium THE CENTER FOR
of Investigative Journalists PUBLIC INTEGRITY
SHOW CONTENTSelrySecrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 2
Table of Contents
4 Introduction: Secret Files 71 Offshore Companies Provide
Expose Offshore’s Global Link Between Corporate
Impact Mogul and Azerbaijan’s
President
17 Caribbean Go-Between
Provided Shelter for Far-Away 77 François Hollande’s
Frauds, Documents Show Campaign Treasurer’s
Investments in the Cayman
31 Lawyers and Accountants Islands
Help Rich Manage Their
Money 81 ‘Crony’ of African Strongman
Among Thai Names in Secret
40 Faux Corporate Directors Offshore Files
Stand in for Fraudsters,
Despots and Spies 88 Mega-Rich Use Tax Havens to
Buy and Sell Masterpieces
47 Ferdinand Marcos’ Daughter
Tied to Offshore Trust in 95 Elites Undermine Putin Rail
Caribbean Against Tax Havens
55 Taxmen Have Little Clue of 99 Ponzi Scheme Used Offshore
Offshore Companies Owned Hideaways to Shuffle
by Greeks Investors’ Money
64 Disclosure of Secret Offshore 106 Deutsche Bank Helped
Documents May Force Top Customers Maintain
Mongolian Lawmaker to Resign Hundreds of Offshore
Entities
66 Canadian Senator’s Husband
Shifted Money Into Offshore 108 French Banks Traded in
Tax Havens Secrecy
Go online for more about the ICIJ’s investigation into offshore secrecy
including videos and related stories at: www.icij.org/offshore
3CO Er CONTENTS FIr ST Ar TICLE 4
vSecrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 3
Table of Contents
113 The Swiss Lawyers Who Help 171 Jailed Property Man Hid
Europe’s Richest Families Assets Offshore During
Park Their Wealth Offshore Divorce
120 Swiss Bank Pushed Offshore 174 Secret Files Reveal
Middleman to Skip Anti- Rothschild’s Offshore Domain
Money Laundering Checks
177 Family of Televangelist Chris for Wealthy Clients
Oyakhilome Incorporated
124 Dutch Banking Giants Helped Secretive Company in Tax
Clients Go Offshore Haven
126 After Multi-Million 183 India Says It Will Investigate
Inheritance, Playboy Sachs Offshore Leaks Revelations
Goes Offshore
187 Bank Owned by Paraguay’s
135 Offshore Documents Solve Leading Presidential
Mystery of Pre-Civil War Candidate Linked to Tax Haven
Helicopter Deal in Congo
192 Crocodile Dundee Actor Paul
144 Offshore Tax Havens Became Hogan Chases His Missing
Traps for Investors Offshore Millions
154 Son of Leading Pakistani 196 Who Uses the Offshore World
Politician Tied to Secret
214 Methodologies: How ICIJ’s Caribbean Company
Project Team Analyzed the
159 Top Malaysian Politicians Use Offshore Files
Offshore Secrecy
220 Follow-Up: Release of
166 Billionaires Among Offshore Records Draws
Thousands of Indonesians Worldwide Response
Found in Secret Offshore
Documents 229 About the ICIJ
Cover Graphic: Tim Meko/Shutterstock
3CO Er CONTENTS FIr ST Ar TICLE 4
vSecrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 4
Graphic: Tim Meko/Shutterstock
Introduction
Secret Files Expose
Offshore’s Global Impact
By Gerard Ryle, Marina Walker Guevara, Michael Hudson,
Nicky Hager, Duncan Campbell and Stefan Candea
Published Online: April 3, 2013
Ca Ch e of 2.5 million files Dozens of journalists sifted
has cracked open the s-eA crets of more than 120,000 through millions of leaked
offshore companies and trusts, - exrecords and thousands posing hidden dealings of pol-iti
cians, con men and the mega-rich of names to produce
the world over.ICIJ’s investigation into The secret records obtained by
the International Consortium of offshore secrecy.
Investigative Journalists lay bare
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vSecrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 5
the names behind covert comp-a
nies and private trusts in the B- rit Key Findings
ish Virgin Islands, the Cook Islands
● Government officials and their
and other offshore hideaways.
families and associates in Azerbai-
They include American doctors
jan, Russia, Canada, Pakistan, the
and dentists and middle-class Greek
Philippines, Thailand, Mongolia and
villagers as well as families an-d as
other countries have embraced the
sociates of long-time despots, Wall
use of covert companies and bank
Street swindlers, Eastern European
accounts.
and Indonesian billionaires, Russian
● The mega-rich use complex offshore corporate executives, international
structures to own mansions, yachts, arms dealers and a sham-director-
art masterpieces and other assets, fronted company that the European
gaining tax advantages and anonym-Union has labeled as a cog in Iran’s
ity not available to average people.nuclear-development program.
The leaked files provide facts ● Many of the world’s top’s banks
and figures — cash transfers, in- cor — including UBS, Clariden and
poration dates, links between c-om Deutsche Bank — have aggressively
panies and individuals — that i-llus worked to provide their customers
trate how offshore financial secrecy with secrecy-cloaked companies in
has spread aggressively around the the British Virgin Islands and other
globe, allowing the wealthy and the offshore hideaways.
well-connected to dodge taxes and
● A well-paid industry of accountants, fueling corruption and economic
middlemen and other opera-woes in rich and poor nations alike.
tives has helped offshore patrons The records detail the offshore
shroud their identities and business holdings of people and companies
interests, providing shelter in many in more than 170 countries and t - er
cases to money laundering or other ritories.
misconduct.The hoard of documents rep-re
sents the biggest stockpile of inside ● Ponzi schemers and other large-scale
information about the offshore s- ys fraudsters routinely use offshore
tem ever obtained by a media or-ga havens to pull off their shell games
nization. The total size of the files, and move their ill-gotten gains.
measured in gigabytes, is more
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vSecrecy for Sale ©2013 Center for Public Integrity 6
than 160 times larger than the leapko rate — can roil economies and pit
of U.S. State Department do-cu nations against each other. Europe’s
ments by Wikileaks in 2010. continuing financial crisis has been
To analyze the documents, ICIJ fueled by a Greek fiscal disaster e- x
collaborated with reporters from Tahce erbated by offshore tax cheating
Guardian and the BBC in the U.K., and by a banking meltdown in the
Le Monde in France, Süddeutsche tiny tax haven of Cyprus, where - lo
Zeitung and Norddeutscher Rund- cal banks’ assets have been inflated
funk in Germany, The Washington by waves of cash from Russia.
Post, the Canadian Broadcasting Anti-corruption campaigners a- r
Corporation (CBC) and 31 other m- e gue that offshore secrecy undermines
dia partners around the world. law and order and forces average
Eighty-six journalists from 46c itizens to pay higher taxes to make
countries used high-tech datau p for revenues that vanish offshore.
crunching and shoe-leather rep-ortStudies have estimated that cross- -bor
ing to sift through emails, accoundte r flows of global proceeds of f-inan
ledgers and other files coverincgi al crimes total between $1 trillion
nearly 30 years. and $1.6 trillion a year.
“I’ve never seen anything like this. ICIJ’s 15-month investigation
This secret world has finally bee-n re found that, alongside perfectl-y le
vealed,” said Arthur Cockfield, a lagwa l transactions, the secrecy and
professor and tax expert at Queen’lsa x oversight offered by the offshore
University in Canada, who reviewedw orld allows fraud, tax dodging and
some of the documents during an political corruption to thrive.
interview with the CBC. He said the
documents remind him of the scene Offshore patrons identified in
in the movie classic The Wizard of the documents include:
Oz in which “they pull back the c -ur
• I n d i v i d u a l s a n d c o m p a n i e s l i n k e d
tain and you see the wizard ope-rat
to Russia’s Magnitsky Affair, a tax
ing this secret machine.”
fraud scandal that has strained
U.S.-Russia relations and led to a
Mobsters and Oligarchs ban on Americans adopting Ru- s
sian orphans.
The vast flow of offshore money —
legal and illegal, personal and c- o •r A V ene z u el a n de a l m a ker a c c u s e d
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of using offshore entities to b - ankeager to find out whether any - as
roll a U.S.-based Ponzi scheme sets in the trust are part of th -e esti
and funneling millions of dollarmsa ted $5 billion her father amassed
in bribes to a Venezuelan gove-rn through corruption.
ment official. Manotoc, a provincial governor in
the Philippines, declined to answer a
• A co r p o r a t e m o g u l w ho w o n b i l-
series of questions about the trust.
lions of dollars in contracts amid
Azerbaijani President Ilham A - li
yev’s massive co