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Tag: UBS

  • Secret Files Expose Offshore Funds ICIJ Story.

    International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) was founded in 1997.

    Its mission is to expose the polluting industries, transnational crime networks, rogue states, and the actions of powerful figures in business and government.

    For details Link is provided at the end of the post.

    Most of us know that ill-gotten wealth by all and sundry, which includes lawyers, Doctors, Business houses and of course Politicians.

    Thanks to a series of mind-boggling scams in India, like 2G,ISRO, CWG,Maharashtra Irrigation,Helicopter and the forerunner Bofors, even a barely literate person knows that the money is being kept in Swiss Banks and that these banks are very secretive about disclosing the identities of their Customers.

    What many may not know is the fact that there are countries which house these Funds under greater secrecy than the Swiss Banks.

    A map of key “tax haven clients” around the world, including the daughter of Ferdinand Marcos and top Spanish art collector Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza.
    A map of key “tax haven clients” around the world, including the daughter of Ferdinand Marcos and top Spanish art collector Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza.

    A List.

    • Bahamas
    • Cyprus
    • Liechtenstein
    • Luxembourg
    • Monaco
    • Panama
    • San Marino
    • Seychelles

    Non-sovereign jurisdictions commonly labelled as tax havens include:

    • Campione d’Italia, Italy
    • Jebel Ali Free Zone, United Arab Emirates
    • Labuan, Malaysia
    • Curaçao (Netherlands)
    • Bermuda
    • British Virgin Islands
    • Cayman Islands
    • Jersey
    • Guernsey
    • Isle of Man
    • Turks and Caicos Islands
    • Alaska, United States
    • Delaware, United States
    • Florida, United States
    • Nevada, United States
    • Texas, United States
    • South Dakota, United States
    • United States Virgin Islands (United States)
    • Wyoming, United States
    • Washington, United States
    • Note that the US is included in the Tax havens list

    The funds are held in an Offshore Trust in these tax-havens.

    The Company address will be a ramshackle building, it may house many such Companies(Trusts)

    Detailed blog on how an offshore fund is created and operated follows.

    Look at the Office of offshore Company holding Millions of Dollars.

    Thousands of offshore entities are headquartered on this building's third floor, which houses TrustNet's Cook Islands office. Photo: Alex Shprintsen
    Thousands of offshore entities are headquartered on this building’s third floor, which houses TrustNet’s Cook Islands office. Photo: Alex Shprintsen

    ICIJ obtained secret files from these banks, Countries, Trusts.

    The statistical highlights of the size of the Documents.

    2.5 Million Files.

    1,20,000 Offshore Companies.

    170 Countries.

    In gigabytes, more than 160 times larger than the leak of U.S. State Department documents by Wikileaks in 2010..

    86 Journalists from 46 Countries were involved in ferreting out the details.

    #0 Years records  unearthed.

    Document Highlights.

    • Government officials and their families and associates in Azerbaijan, Russia, Canada, Pakistan, the Philippines, Thailand, Mongolia and other countries have embraced the use of covert companies and bank accounts.
    • The mega-rich use complex offshore structures to own mansions, yachts, art masterpieces and other assets, gaining tax advantages and anonymity not available to average people.
    • Many of the world’s top’s banks – including UBS, Clariden and Deutsche Bank – have aggressively worked to provide their customers with secrecy-cloaked companies in the British Virgin Islands and other offshore hideaways.
    • A well-paid industry of accountants, middlemen and other operatives has helped offshore patrons shroud their identities and business interests, providing shelter in many cases to money laundering or other misconduct.
    • Ponzi schemers and other large-scale fraudsters routinely use offshore havens to pull off their shell games and move their ill-gotten gains.

     

    Who are exposed?

    • Individuals and companies linked to Russia’s Magnitsky Affair, a tax fraud scandal that has strained U.S.-Russia relations and led to a ban on Americans adopting Russian orphans.
    • A Venezuelan deal maker accused of using offshore entities to bankroll a U.S.-based Ponzi scheme and funneling millions of dollars in bribes to a Venezuelan government official.
    • A corporate mogul who won billions of dollars in contracts amid Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s massive construction boom even as he served as a director of secrecy-shrouded offshore companies owned by the president’s daughters.
    • Indonesian billionaires with ties to the late dictator Suharto, who enriched a circle of elites during his decades in power.

     

    Tony Merchant, one of Canada’s top class-action lawyers, took extra steps to maintain the privacy of aCook Islands trust that he’d stocked with more than $1 million in 1998, the documents show.

    In a filing to Canadian tax authorities, Merchant checked “no” when asked if he had foreign assets of more than $100,000 in 1999, court records show.

    Between 2002 and 2009, he often paid his fees to maintain the trust by sending thousands of dollars in cash and traveler’s checks stuffed into envelopes rather than using easier-to-trace bank checks or wire transfers, according to documents from the offshore services firm that oversaw the trust for him.

    One file note warned the firm’s staffers that Merchant would “have a st[r]oke” if they tried to communicate with him by fax.

    Tony Merchant.

    It is unclear whether his wife, Pana Merchant, a Canadian senator, declared her personal interest in the trust on annual financial disclosure forms.

    Under legislative rules, she had to disclose every year to the Senate’s ethics commissioner that she was a beneficiary of the trust, but the information was confidential.

    The Merchants declined requests for comment.

    Other high profile names identified in the offshore data include the wife of Russia’s deputy prime minister, Igor Shuvalov, and two top executives with Gazprom, the Russian government-owned corporate behemoth that is the world’s largest extractor of natural gas.

    Shuvalov’s wife and the Gazprom officials had stakes in BVI companies, documents show. All three declined comment.

    In a neighboring land, the deputy speaker of Mongolia’s Parliament said he was considering resigning from office after ICIJ questioned him about records showing he has an offshore company and a secret Swiss bank account…

     

    Source: ICIJ

    http://www.icij.org/offshore/secret-files-expose-offshores-global-impact

    Related articles

  • Who Runs The World,Banks Caught in Frauds?

    Of these banks which fix Price of  Gold listed below,HSBC was caught laundering drug money and despite Public Show of anger by the US it is being let off.

     

    Goldman Sachs was bailed out, the Executives had Bonus paid out to them even after bail out and stinging comment of President Obama was met by severe criticism by The Finance Industry!

     

    Societe Genearale
    Societe Genearale

    Deutsche Bank AG (DBK), JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), UBS AG (UBSN) and Depfa Bank Plc were convicted by a Milan judge for their role in overseeing fraud by their bankers in the sale of derivatives to the city of Milan.(Bloomberg .com)

     

    “Barclays boss Bob Diamond has been shamed into giving up his bonus after his bank was fined £290million for trying to rig money markets.

    The massive fine was imposed by the UK Financial Services Authority and US watchdogs after Barclays was found to be deliberately manipulating the rate at which banks lend to each other.

    The bank knowingly fed false information into the system used to calculate the Libor rate for British banks and Euribor rate for European banks so its traders could make profits by speculating on rates.(The mirror UK)

     

    Continuing on the trail of exposing what is rapidly becoming one of the largest frauds in commodity markets history is the most recent interview by Eric King with GATA’s Adrian Douglas, Harvey Orgen (who recently testified before the CFTC hearing) and his son, Lenny, in which the two discuss their visit to the only bullion bank vault in Canada, that of ScotiaMocatta, located at 40 King Street West in Toronto, and find the vault is practically empty!

    http://www.zerohedge.com/article/latest-gold-fraud-bombshell-canadas-only-bullion-bank-gold-vault-practically-empty

    The multi-million pound loss occurred within weeks of the investment bank uncovering the much larger multi-billion fraud by rogue trader Jerome Kerviel. On top of the €4bn hit Mr Kerviel’s actions caused, the bank suffered a dramatic blow to its reputation.

    Although smaller, the Sfr182m hole uncovered in 2007 led to lawsuits and the liquidation of the Swiss subsidiary in which it took place. SocGen did not refer to the problems in any of its annual reports published at the time.

    The alleged fraud took place in December 2007. It happened at Rosbank Switzerland, the Swiss branch of SocGen’s Russian subsidiary Rosbank.

    The loss is detailed in Rosbank’s 2007 annual report in which it is described as a “fraud”. In its 2008 update Rosbank gave more details including how the situation had been remedied – through the injection of Sfr174.7m of shareholder fund.(telegraph UK).

    Members who fix Gold Prices.

     

    • Scotia-Mocatta — successor to Mocatta & Goldsmid and part of Bank of Nova Scotia
    • Barclays Capital — Replaced N M Rothschild & Sons when they abdicated
    • Deutsche Bank — Owner of Sharps Pixley, itself the merger of Sharps Wilkinswith Pixley & Abell
    • HSBC — Owner of Samuel Montagu & Co.
    • Société Générale — Replaced Johnson Matthey and CSFB as fifth seat.
    • These are the banks that Fix Gold Prices?

    You expect them be honest?

    The purport of this post(second part) has something else to bring out altogether

    As the post is getting too long I will conclude in the next post and explain who really runs the World and Economy, definitely not the Governments!

    Related;

    There are a couple of things which defy Logic and common sense.

    For instance,

    The ever Increasing price of Gold.

    The Price of Petroleum Products.

    Gold;

    http://ramanisblog.in/2013/02/10/who-controls-the-worldeconomy-gold-petroleum/

  • Linked Connecticut Shooting Libor Banks Rate Fixing Hearing?

    Connecting Shooting which killed children among others is now rumored to be linked to the Libor Scandal by The Banks.

    There is a hearing in the US Senate and the father of the killer of the innocent is reportedly linked to the Libor Scandal and the Testimony.

    Robert Holmes ,father of  the killer James Holmes, is a high level executive of the Financial Rating Company Figo

     The Father of another killer is an executive of a Bank.’GE Financial‘

    There are the other theories such as Drug Addiction and broken homes.

    Most importantly Gun Control issue in the United States.

    Either the Libor scandal  or the Anti Gun Control Lobby might have been the main reason.

    Truth is yet to emerge.

    If it is proved that Libor is the root cause, rest assured that nothing may come out of the investigation

    Financial Institutions, of late  are found to have been indulging in skullduggery, from manipulation of markets to laundering Drug money.

    One remembers Goldman Sachs and HSBC, the latter has been filed heavily for laundering drug money and curiously no executive was arrested(please read my blogs on Goldman Sachs and HSBC money laundering, its escape, filed under Banks.

    At times like these I am tempted to believe the presence of a killer Cartel that is manipulating the World Governments(my blogs on this subject will give  some inputs)

    What is The Libor Scandal?

    Bank of America.
    Bank Of America

    ‘The Libor scandal is a series of fraudulent actions connected to the Libor (London Interbank Offered Rate) and the resulting investigation and reaction. The Libor is an average interest rate calculated through submissions of interest rates by major banks in London. The scandal arose when it was discovered that banks were falsely inflating or deflating their rates so as to profit from trades, or to give the impression that they were more creditworthy than they were.[3] Libor underpins approximately $350 trillion in derivatives. It is controlled by the British Bankers’ Association (BBA).[4]..

    The Wall Street Journal reported in March 2011 that regulators were focusing on Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc. and UBS AG in their probe of Libor rate manipulation.[33] A year later, it was reported in February 2012 that the U.S. Department of Justice was conducting a criminal investigation into Libor abuse.[34] Among the abuses being investigated were the possibility that traders were in direct communication with bankers before the rates were set, thus allowing them an unprecedented amount of insider knowledge into global instruments.[35] In court documents, a trader from the Royal Bank of Scotland claimed that it was common practice among senior employees at his bank to make requests to the bank’s rate setters as to the appropriate Libor rate, and that the bank also made on occasions rate requests for some hedge funds.[36] One trader’s messages from Barclays Bank indicated that for each basis point (0.01%) that Libor was moved, those involved could net “about a couple of million dollars”.[35

    On 27 June 2012, Barclays Bank was fined $200 million by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission,[5] $160 million by the United States Department of Justice[6] and £59.5 million by the Financial Services Authority[7] for attempted manipulation of the Libor and Euribor rates.[38] The United States Department of Justice and Barclays officially agreed that “the manipulation of the submissions affected the fixed rates on some occasions”.[39][40][41]

    Barclays manipulated rates for at least two reasons. Routinely, from at least as early as 2005, traders sought particular rate submissions to benefit their financial positions. Later, during the 2007–2012 global financial crisis, they artificially lowered rate submissions to make their bank seem healthy.[6]…..

    By 4 July 2012 the breadth of the scandal was evident and became the topic of analysis on news and financial programs that attempted to explain the importance of the scandal.[47] Two days later, it was announced that the U.K. Serious Fraud Office had also opened a criminal investigation into manipulation of interest rates. The investigation was not limited to Barclays.[48][49] It has been reported since then that regulators in at least seven countries are investigating the rigging of the Libor and other interest rates.[50] Around 20 major banks have been named in investigations and court cases.[51]…

    Early estimates are that the rate manipulation scandal cost U.S. states, counties, and local governments at least $6 billion in fraudulent interest payments, above $4 billion that state and local governments have already had to spend to unwind their positions exposed to rate manipulation.[52] An increasingly smaller set of banks are participating in setting the LIBOR, calling into question its future as a benchmark standard, but without any viable alternative to replace it.[53]9Wiki)

    List of Banks involved in the Libor Scandal.

    The American banks included in the panel surveyed by the BBA for U.S. dollar fixing are:

    • The Bank of America
    • JP Morgan Chase
    • Citibank, NA

    There are 16 non-U.S. banks surveyed for U.S. dollar fixing in London. These banks are:

    • Bank of Nova Scotia
    • Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd
    • Barclays Bank plc
    • BNP Paribas
    • Credit Agricole CIB
    • Credit Suisse
    • Deutsche Bank AG
    • HSBC
    • Lloyds TSB Bank plc
    • Rabobank
    • Royal Bank of Canada
    • Société Générale
    • Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation
    • The Norinchukin Bank
    • The Royal Bank of Scotland Group
    • UBS AG

     

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  • What’s Stopping India from Swiss Banks?

    UBS offices in Zurich, Switzerland
    Image via Wikipedia

    It is a surprise that India is still hiding behind  ‘Secrets’.

    A Credit Suisse banker has been arrested in connection with a long-running US tax evasion investigation and could be one of several individuals likely to face charges this week as prosecutors turn their focus from institutions to bankers and wealthy clients, said people familiar with the matter.

    Christos Bagios was arrested about two weeks ago on entering the US and is in transit to a detention centre in southern Florida, according to the Bureau of Prisons’ website and people familiar with the matter.

    The arrest is part of a US government crackdown on tax evasion schemes that has shaken Swiss banking secrecy.

    In 2009, the US Department of Justice and Internal Revenue Service reached a landmark deal with UBS in which the Swiss bank agreed to pay $780m and turn over thousands of client names.

    – http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/eb39ff2c-7a71-11df-9cd7-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1EeTPTFBf

    Switzerland yesterday ended months of uncertainty over the diluting of bank secrecy when its parliament finally approved legislation allowing the transfer of the names of thousands of American clients of UBS suspected of evading tax owed to the US authorities.

    The decision followed days of parliamentary wrangling that had threatened to delay a crucial treaty between Bern and Washington authorising the transfer. This could have triggered a crisis in bilateral relations and threatened the future of UBS, Switzerland’s largest bank.

    Under the agreement, negotiated last August, Switzerland promised within a year to pass to the US authorities the names of 4,450 wealthy American UBS clients suspected of having undeclared accounts at the bank.

    The bilateral agreement followed a lengthy US investigation that showed UBS had broken laws by helping Americans with offshore Swiss accounts evade tax through elaborate financial structures such as sham companies in Hong Kong and Panama.

    In February 2009 UBS, the world’s second-biggest wealth manager, agreed to pay $780m to settle criminal charges.

     

    However, the US authorities pursued a linked, but separate, civil action requiring the bank to release the names of about 19,000 US clients with offshore Swiss accounts.

    Differences were only resolved last August through a special treaty between Bern and Washington, in which the Swiss promised to deliver the 4,450 UBS client names within a year.

    Swiss parliamentary approval then became necessary after a top Swiss court ruled this year that the Bern-Washington deal broke the country’s bank secrecy law and the government should have gained parliamentary acceptance first.

     

  • KGB PAID MONEY TO SONIA, RAHUL, RAJIV GANDHI.

    Sonia Gandhi, Indian politician, president of ...
    Image via Wikipedia

    How can one expect that Truth will come out in 2G and S Band Scam?

    What is distressing is that the BJP has failed to unearth the sordid details.

    It makes one wonder about the protestations by the opposition parties when they are not in power .

    All seem to be in cahoots.

    JPC or not, the show of inquiry will go on and nothing will come out of it.

    Story:

    The greed of Sonia Gandhi and her family has crossed all bounds of decency.

    With just three weeks to go before the Congress-led UPA government’s term ends, Ottavio Quattrocchi, the lone surviving suspect in the Bofors payoff case, no longer figures in the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)’s list of wanted persons.

    The 12-year Interpol Red Corner Notice (RCN) against the Italian businessman has been taken off the “Interpol Notices” section of the agency’s website.

    Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Tuesday said it was a “farewell gift” from the Congress-led government to a “close friend” of party president Sonia Gandhi.

    CONGRESS PARTY – SHOVING BOFORS AND “Q” CONNECTIONS UNDER THE CARPET

    THE LOOT OF INDIAN MONEY CONTINUES: AFTER THE BRITISH EAST INDIA COMPANY – ITS NOW ______

    In an article written on March 18th 2009: INDIA has $1.4 Trillion of Illegal money stashed in Swiss Banks – Time to bring it home !, I wrote in the first para: “Rajeev Gandhi’s untimely death left Sonia Gandhi extremely wealthy. The true extent of her wealth became known only when the Soviet archives were thrown open following the collapse of the Soviet Union. KGB archives revealed that as far back as 1982, when Indira Gandhi was still prime minister, Soviet trading agencies were channeling funds into a company controlled by her son and future Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

    This was also brought to light by Harvard Russian scholar Yvgenia Albats in her book The State Within A State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia. The Swiss news-magazine Schweizer Illustrierte (November 11, 1991) provided more details. Citing newly—opened KGB records, it reported that Sonia Gandhi, widow of the former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, was controlling a secret account worth 2.5 billion Swiss francs (about 2 billion dollars at current exchange rates) in a Swiss bank in her minor son’s name.

    “Dr. Yevgeniya Albats is a Soviet journalist who was appointed as member of the official KGB Commission set up by President Yeltsin in 1991. She had full access to secret files of the KGB.

    PAYMENTS TO GANDHI FAMILY AUTHORIZED BY RESOLUTION IN RUSSIA:

    Dr. Albats disclosed in her book that KGB chief Victor Chebrikov in December 1985 had sought in writing from the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), ‘authorization to make payments in US dollars to the family members of Mr. Rajiv Gandhi, namely Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Ms Paola Maino, mother of Sonia Gandhi.’

    CPSU payments were authorized by a resolution, CPSU/CC/No 11228/3 dated December 20, 1985; and endorsed by the USSR Council of Ministers in Directive No. 2633/Rs dated December 12, 1985. These payments had been coming since 1971, as payments received by Sonia Gandhi’s family, and ‘have been audited in CPSU/CC resolution No. 11187/22 OP dated October 12, 1984.’

    How precise must one get to book the guilty? These are official KGB records.

    INDIAN ATTITUDE AT G-20: LUKEWARM TO FRENCH PROPOSAL

    The Indian delegation attending G-20 summit did not seem at all keen on supporting the French demand to make tax havens transparent and create a new global financial architecture that has more regulation.

    Prime Minister Manmohan Singh‘s reaction to the growing chorus for getting back ill-gotten wealth, squirreled in tax havens, has been quite casual. This makes it quite clear that he would not back the demands of French President, Nicholas Sarkozy, and others to regulate and tame the global financial system ahead of any coordinated stimulus.

    Indians, Swiss bank sources claimed in 2006, have more than $ 1.4 trillion squirreled in their bank vaults. This figure could reach astronomical levels if the funds of Indians in other tax havens are added up. Experts estimate that the total quantum of money that has flown out to safe vaults abroad could go beyond $ 2-3 trillion dollars. So substantial is this amount that if it returns to India then it could make a serious difference in alleviating poverty and transforming its inadequate infrastructure. More importantly, it will also bring out in the open the identity of those who perpetrated this organised loot for so many years. Most of the illegal funds are sourced from defence deals, corruption and large scale siphoning off from development programmes. If the details of the Swiss bank account holders ever come out in the open, it will be a fascinating story of how India has been pauperised by its ruling elite.

    CURIOUS CASE OF BILLIONS IN PUNE STUD FARM:CLOSE RELATIVE WITH CLOSE TIES WITH RULING PARTY !

    For more than three years now, INDIA have not been able to make much headway in tracing the $ 8 billion found in a mysterious Pune-based stud farm owner’s account in UBS, Switzerland. The money trail led to Virgin Island and to Saudi arms leader, Adnan Khashoggi, but the enforcement agencies have drawn no conclusions as one of the partners of the stud farm owner is a close relative of a big business family with close ties with the ruling party. This old business family, besides other interests, also serves as agents of some arms manufacturers. The belief is that pressure from this powerful group has prevented government to take its probe with the UBS to its logical conclusion.

    However, after UBS wilted under US pressure to release the details of their nationals that evaded tax and parked their funds with them, there has been a flicker of hope in other countries too, that such details may finally see the light of the day. Indians have not shown much urgency in following up on US government’s enterprise- due a host of reasons.

    This is election time in India and a wrong time to follow bad money. Indian elections are funded through black money and a lot of cash sitting in foreign bank accounts returns through the hawala route.

    DOMESTIC POLITICS: CONGRESS MAKES MONEY HERE TOO (and so does all other political parties too!)

    Even in domestic politics it seems the Congress Party (referred to as Palm party) has made money making an art. The article by Maloy Krishna Dhar clearly alludes to a chain of command of making money .Maloy Dhar writes: What you have given here is the darshan money ( BuA: Indian word meaning giving money to someone just to see a person). It qualifies you to be short listed and your name to be forwarded by the Pradesh party to the High Command (HC). The High Command (whosoever it might be) would be the final arbitrator. The HC is helped by A, B. C. & D (no name please).

    Once your name is forwarded, go over to Delhi with a few supporters meet A, B, C, & D with adequate lubricants. Carry trunk full of money. Do not forget to meet X Patel. He is the conscience keeper of the HC. Satisfy him with the demanded amount. The final satisfaction lay with the HC. If you have any conduit to reach the HC, spend lavishly and reach there. The entire process may cost you rupees 10 million (= Rupees one crore).

    (BuA: Mr X Patel – hmmm, who can that be – Sonia’s close confidante – AHMED PATEL??, HC = High Command a possible reference to SONIA GANDHI).

    It’s India’s money that has been looted by foreigners and corrupt middlemen and most treasonously – by the executive branch of defense department of Govt of India. For every sub-standard defense procurement, look no further than the tax havens abroad where our politicians have stashed our hard earned money for their family. I will certainly not tolerate a flight of my country’s capital by foreigners – again !

    At a time when our poor farmers are languishing in debt burden and economic crisis is hurting the average Indian – this illegal money stashed abroad is making us seethe in anger.

    Unwinding of tax havens, MANY OF THEM UNDER THE CONTROL OF THE UK GOVERNMENT, would ensure that the development funds marked for the poor in Africa, Latin America and Asia do not find their way to the safes of banks in foreign countries. After all, many of the multinational banks have been recipient of drug money and kickbacks. History would bear testimony that some of the money in these banks have origin in opium. The world would be a different place when arms dealers, mercenaries and war-mongers, drug dealers have no place to hide their cash. Surely, this would impact terror funding, covert wars and so much of misery that this unaccounted wealth heaps on the poor of the world.

    http://bengalunderattack.blogspot.com/2009/04/kgb-paid-money-to-sonia-rahul-rajiv.html