Swiss Bank exits FATCA programme
(CNS Business): Barclays Bank’s Swiss operations is ending its cooperation with the Internal Revenue Service’s efforts to prevent investors from investing money in foreign countries with more amenable tax structures and policies. During a Zurich speech, Barclays bank executive Francesco Grosoli announced that the firm’s Swiss operations had “recently exited the program”, after evaluating its legal options, according to a report from Heartlander.
Grosoli declined to reveal additional details, but said that the bank had decided to end compliance with the US extra-territorial enforcement actions at some point within the last “three or four months”.
The program, organized under the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), requires foreign banks to provide confidential information to the IRS. Non-compliance carries heavy penalties levied upon foreign firms, with fines as high as half of the value of the American assets in question.
Announcing the law’s passage in 2010, President Barack Obama warned financial institutions that if they did not cooperate with the US, “we will assume that they are sheltering money in tax havens and act accordingly”.
Since the law’s passage, 25 bank employees have been accused of helping clients evade taxes. Two of Switzerland’s top banks, UBS and Credit Suisse, have paid fines of over $3 billion combined, while dozens of other bank are still under investigation.
