Category: Banking
8 Best Tax Haven Countries to Open an Offshore Bank Account
When it comes to the greatest offshore bank accounts, people will give you a lot of different recommendations. This isn't to say that some of them are incorrect. There are simply a plethora of possibilities available. ... - Continue reading
7 Ways You’re Accidentally Committing Tax Fraud
Not every fraud artist is a sketchy identity thief or faux Nigerian prince from the dark corners of the internet. In fact, you might end up committing accidental tax fraud or accidental tax evasion yourself if you don’t pay careful attention during this tax season. ... - Continue reading
United States: OCC Concludes That National Banks May Provide Cryptocurrency Custody Services
On July 22, 2020, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency ("OCC") concluded in Interpretive Letter #1170 that national banks may provide cryptocurrency custody services to customers in both a fiduciary and non-fiduciary role. ... - Continue reading
$65 billion cash mystery puzzles Britain’s audit office
Mystery in the economy of Britain. How come there is an increase in circulation of pound notes when there is a decrease in day-to-day cash transactions? ... - Continue reading
Repatriation vows exceed NT$200bn
As of Thursday last week, the Ministry of Finance had received applications to repatriate NT$207.6 billion (US$7.03 billion) in overseas funds since a repatriation law took effect on Aug. 15 last year, the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported on Saturday, citing Minister of Finance Su Jain-rong (蘇建榮). The amount would be NT$210 billion if applications filed on Friday were included, Su told a news conference in Taipei on Friday. ... - Continue reading
QIB continues to introduce new features on its award-winning mobile application
Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB) has introduced new features to its award-winning Mobile App, in line with the bank’s ongoing efforts to provide customers with innovative digital options to fulfill all their banking needs remotely.Developed with customers’ daily banking requirements in mind, the QIB Mobile App now allows customers to benefit from new and simplified features, including the postponement of their Personal Finance Monthly Installment, opening the exclusive Certificates of Deposit for COVID-19 frontliners, filling and submitting the Common Reporting Standard (CRS), and completing Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) declarations. ... - Continue reading
Switzerland: Banking Regulation 2020 – Switzerland
In the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008/2009, Switzerland launched a massive overhaul of its financial regulations. ... - Continue reading
Lebanon passes law to lift banking secrecy
Lebanon’s Justice Minister Marie-Claude Najm said on Thursday that the Lebanese cabinet has approved a draft law to lift banking secrecy, MTV local TV channel reported. Also, Lebanon’s financial prosecutor Ali Ibrahim froze the assets and properties of 20 Lebanese banks. Lebanon has lately witnessed a shortage in U.S. currency… – Continue reading
World Bank aid ‘leakage’ may flow to tax havens: study
“Our estimates suggest a leakage rate of around 7.5 percent for the average highly aid-dependent country,” the study concluded. ... - Continue reading
Cayman tops ranking of money hideouts
Cayman is now the top enabler of financial secrecy in the world, according to the findings from the Tax Justice Network’s Financial Secrecy Index 2020. In second and third place respectively, were the United States and Switzerland. The Tax Justice Network has called on policymakers to prioritise sanctions against Cayman… – Continue reading
GTBank Urges FG to Introduce Structural Reforms
The recurring inability of government to achieve its projected non-oil revenues over the years points to the need for urgent structural reforms, a report by Guaranty Trust Bank Plc (GTBank) has stated. The bank stated this in its 2020 macroeconomic and banking sector outlook, obtained yesterday. It stressed the need… – Continue reading
Nigeria: How Nigeria’s Common Reporting Standard Regulations Will Affect Banks, Insurance Companies, Asset Managers, And Other Financial Institutions
Details about the Common Reporting Standard in Nigeria ... - Continue reading
Taxing the world of cryptocurrencies is complicated
An insight into the world of "cryptocurrencies" ... - Continue reading
Ukraine, U.S. ratify agreement on FATCA de-offshorization
The bill foresees that the Ukrainian banks will open information about the accounts of U.S. citizens in this country; Ukraine, on the other hand, will not be able to get the respective information about Ukrainian accounts in the States The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine has passed the document about ratification… – Continue reading
United States: Webinar: Supreme Court’s reconsideration of Auer Deference may undermine FFIEC manual.
Regulations governing BSA/AML compliance are often ambiguous, leading to disagreements with regulators about whether financial institutions are in compliance with those regulations. ... - Continue reading
Dutch government asks banks to give American expats more time to deal with FATCA
The Dutch government is urging banks to be accommodating towards American nationals who risk having their bank accounts closed because of US fiscal regulations as it calls on EU member states to campaign together for changes to American tax laws which are affecting thousands who have American nationality but no… – Continue reading
Ukrainian government approves bill ratifying FATCA
The Cabinet of Ministers has approved a bill to ratify the Agreement between the governments of Ukraine and the United States to improve tax compliance and application of provisions of the U.S. Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and related bills, the Ukrainian Finance Ministry’s press service reported. “On September… – Continue reading
British citizens born in America face having bank accounts frozen
Tens of thousands of British citizens born in the US but only lived there for a few months or years face having their bank accounts frozen as part of a crackdown by the US tax authorities. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is ordering British banks to hand over the… – Continue reading
United States: D.C. Circuit Expands U.S. Prosecutors’ Reach Over Foreign Bank Documents
In a recent decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit unanimously affirmed a district court order compelling three Chinese banks (not currently identified) to produce financial records in response to subpoenas issued by U.S. federal prosecutors, including records that were unrelated to the banks' U.S. operations or U.S. correspondent accounts. ... - Continue reading
Tax payments made easy
HAVING trouble paying taxes? Fret no more, as paying taxes will be as easy as ordering your favorite brown sugar milk tea online. But before we dive into the details, a brief background is in order: The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has adopted the National Retail Payment System (NRPS)… – Continue reading
Ukraine: NBU Will Develop The Tool For Verifying Information About Ultimate Beneficiaries
The NBU's accession to the Memorandum on cooperation in developing a mechanism for verifying information about the beneficial owners (the "Memorandum") is quite logical and even is expected according to the obligation of banks to identify bank account holders. ... - Continue reading
Bermuda Monetary Authority: 50 Years Later
As the Bermuda Monetary Authority [BMA] celebrates 50 years in 2019, we take a look back at the last five decades. From providing sound policy advice to pushing Bermuda forward as a reputable place to conduct business, the BMA has had an incredible impact on Bermuda’s financial landscape. 1990-1999 Exchange… – Continue reading
Banks dominate list of top corporate taxpayers
Country’s bank sector with eight private commercial banks dominated the list of top-10 highest corporate taxpayers in last fiscal year (2018-2019) despite a cut in the corporate tax rate for the sector. The 10 highest corporate taxpayers paid a total of Tk 5,843.44 crore in corporate income tax in FY19… – Continue reading
Luxembourg: Luxembourg Government Submits Bill To Parliament Implementing The EU Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive 2 Into Domestic Law
Luxembourg corporate income taxpayers, including Luxembourg permanent establishments of foreign entities, will be subject to the Draft Law as from 1 January 2020. In addition, provisions targeting reverse hybrid mismatches will be applicable to Luxembourg transparent partnerships that would be treated as opaque by their nonresident owners as from 1 January 2022. ... - Continue reading
UK: HSBC Is Paying Hundreds Of Millions To Settle Tax Fraud Allegations
HSBC's Swiss private banking arm has agreed to pay nearly 300 million euros to settle a tax fraud case in Belgium. The settlement comes six months after a French court ordered another Swiss lender, UBS, to pay 4.5 billion euros for illegally solicitin ... - Continue reading
High Court confirms ATO can use information from data leaks
Today the High Court confirmed that the ATO may use information obtained from data leaks, even if leaked from a law firm. Second Commissioner Jeremy Hirschhorn said today’s decision in Glencore International v. Commissioner of Taxation means the ATO can continue to use the ‘Paradise Papers’ and other similar data… – Continue reading
FIC denies ignoring SME Bank looting
THE director of the Financial Intelligence Centre, Leonie Dunn, says the centre did not turn a blind eye to the disappearance of around N$350 million from the now-defunct SME Bank. ... - Continue reading
FBR collects Rs1bln in revenue from foreign fund transfers
KARACHI: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) collected one billion rupees in withholding tax revenue on funds transferred abroad through credit and debit cards in a year, official statistics showed. The government opened the avenue for revenue collection a year ago considering the growing trend of payment through plastic cards…. – Continue reading
Banks tell BB single-digit rates not possible now
Top executives of banks on Sunday informed Bangladesh Bank that bringing down the interest rates to single digit would not be possible now considering the liquidity situation in the country’s banking sector. Some of the banks were even paying 9.5 per cent interest against deposits of state-owned entities and more… – Continue reading
Georgia: Georgia Introduces Rules For Classification Of Taxpayers; Amends Refund Procedure
On February 5, 2019, the Georgian Ministry of Finance issued Order No. 30 on the classification of taxpayers, which has entered into force on February 7, 2019. ... - Continue reading
Malaysia Explains New Cap On Interest Expense Deductions
The Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia has released new guidance on restrictions to the deductibility of interest expenses. ... - Continue reading
Singapore Bankers ‘Flooded’ With Inquiries from Hong Kong – Reports
Following Hong Kong’s extradition bill protests, wealth managers and private banks have seen increased queries from clients looking to set up channels to move assets to Singapore. MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore) officials have reportedly been asking wealth managers not to aggressively target Hong Kong clients in their market campaigns,… – Continue reading
Portugal: Central bank to disclose public report on large debtors
The Bank of Portugal (BdP) is to publicly disclose aggregated information about large bank debtors by 17 July, announced the chair of the Budget and Finance Committee. On 23 May, the central bank sent parliament an extraordinary report on the problematic loans and other assets that caused banking problems and… – Continue reading
Bank of Singapore’s Hong Kong CEO on Developing a Greater China Proposition
As Bank of Singapore’s Global Market Head for Greater China and North Asia, and since March 2018 also Hong Kong CEO, Derrick Tan has plenty of challenges in front of him. But he can draw on from his multi-faceted background – he spent five years as an investigating officer with… – Continue reading
Swiss banks accounts: Indian details to be transferred
Pointing to volume, Swiss office says several dispatches may be needed. According to the two Swiss agencies, India is among 73 countries with whom information on bank accounts will be shared this year — AEOIs were implemented with 36 countries last year. The stage is set for the first exchange… – Continue reading
Israel seeks Swiss help in identifying undeclared accounts
Swiss authorities are considering a request from the Israeli finance ministry for assistance in identifying Israelis with undeclared assets at two Swiss private banks. ... - Continue reading
Commission should have a wider scope
Tracing funny money is not easy Our prime minister intends to constitute an enquiry commission to look into ballooning of debt burden over the past 10 years. Let it cover related benami, money-laundering or other pseudo-financial transactions also. While debt burden pauperized citizens, the offenders became richer. Tracking debt balloon… – Continue reading
Nigeria Signs Off On Common Reporting Standard With OECD
As we await official communication, information reaching us have it that Nigeria has signed off on the Common Reporting Standard (CRS) with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). As publicly stated on Wikipedia, ‘The Common Reporting Standard (CRS) is an information standard for the Automatic Exchange Of Information… – Continue reading
Anti-Money Laundering Software Market to Generate the Revenue of US$ 4,262.0 Mn by 2026
Companies, especially in the financial services industry are investing in the anti-money laundering software to effectively track the transactions and eliminate the risk of fraudulent. Companies offering anti-money laundering software are also focusing on providing effective and efficient software including currency transaction reporting software, transaction monitoring software, compliance management software,… – Continue reading
Court rules John Doe summons to identify law firm clients isn’t barred by attorney-client privilege
Section 7609(f) of the tax code allows the Internal Revenue Service to use a “John Doe” summons when the target is unknown. It has been used successfully by the IRS against banks and other financial institutions to find offshore accounts. Now, a district court in the Western District of Texas… – Continue reading
Tax substitution as double taxation
The power to levy tax in Nigeria, being a federation, is shared between the Federal, State and Local governments. To avoid double taxation, the tax system spells out which government unit (federal, state or local) has the power to levy tax on specific persons and matters. The Federal Inland Revenue… – Continue reading
Ex-chiropractor gets 5-year prison term for tax evasion
A former chiropractor who evaded paying more than $500,000 in income taxes and didn’t report a Russian bank account where he deposited more than $1.5 million is now headed to prison. Federal prosecutors say Carlo Amato received a five-year sentence Tuesday. The 57-year-old Beachwood man owned and operated a Lakewood… – Continue reading
