Multinazionali americane e profitti offshore

[FaGal]

http://www.finfacts.ie/printpage/ame...overseaspr.htm

sono riuscito in qualche modo a pubblicare questi dati. Purtroppo la fonte originaria non consentiva di farlo.
Vi dico solo una cosa divertentissima: all'autore, ottimo consulente di fiscalità internazionale e da me apprezzato commentatore, Martin Sullivan sono giunte delle repliche; non ve le posso pubblicare (fonte non me lo consente) ..fidatevi sulla parola. Una da 24 multinazionali che si fanno chiamare il gruppo delle 24..ma la chicca è, mi spiace dirlo, Citigroup (ancora lei ) che risponde in questo modo...Mr Sullivan i suoi dati non sono corretti; in riferimento a Cayman mi spiace dirvi che noi non operiamo con filiali in loco ma direttamente dagli USA E qui Beppe Grillo ci farebbe su una bella battuta

[FaGal]

Per la precisione, la replica riguarda l'uso di entità terze, cosa che viene esclusa poichè legittimamente Citigroup opera tramite una filiale che è di Citibank NA e poi lla sezione 954 (h) del Subpart F del Capitolo 26 dell' USC da legittimimente il diritto a esentare profitti ritratti da attività bancarie finanziarie fino al 31 12 2007 (salvo proproghe )

un bel vantaggio per le le società Usa..non v'è che dire

[FaGal]

BUSINESS LIFE/ The tax avoidance story as a morality tale/ CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY/ Does the duty to pay taxes rank with social and enviro

Financial Times UK via NewsEdge Corporation : In the US, avoiding taxes has been dubbed unpatriotic. In the UK, the Inland Revenue has compared it with drink-driving. Tax avoidance is now firmly on the agenda of the corporate social responsibility movement, according to the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Reluctant taxpayers have long faced moral pressure. But the effort to defeat tax avoidance by appealing to the conscience of taxpayers has recently stepped up a gear as tax authorities around the world try to stop the erosion of the corporate tax base.

Should companies take notice? Does aggressive tax planning put a company's reputation as a good corporate citizen at risk? Or is it simply minimising costs - an essential duty to shareholders?

The reason these questions are being asked with increased urgency is that companies have become increasingly adept at reducing their tax bills.

When Robert McIntyre, director of Citizens for Tax Justice, a campaign group, analysed the tax payments of 275 Fortune 500 companies in 2002 and 2003, he found that the average rate was less than half the statutory 35 per cent and 82 paid zero or less in federal income taxes. A recent FT investigation by John Plender into tax payments by UK subsidiaries of multinationals uncovered a similar picture.

In part, these low tax rates reflect government-inspired corporate tax breaks. They also reflect artificial ways of reducing tax bills which are often of questionable legality. Examples include the use of tax havens and complex lease-back deals.

The effort expended on reducing tax bills is partly due to the growing emphasis on shareholder value. We have moved into a much more competitive environment, says Jeffrey Owens, director of the OECD's centre for tax policy and administration. Increasingly, multinationals see tax as a cost. Tax departments are now seen as profit centres. There is a mismatch between risk and reward if penalties are low and there is not a high risk of detection.

Moreover, globalisation has created new opportunities for tax avoidance. National tax legislation has failed to remain effective in the 21st century global economy and has not been replaced or sufficiently strengthened by effective international legislation, says Pete Coleman of the Tax Justice Network, a newly-established international campaign group.

But the tax planning industry defends its methods vigorously - and cites globalisation as part of that defence. Minimising corporate tax bills can play a crucial role in attracting and retaining multinationals which might otherwise set up in countries with lower taxes, says Aidan O'Carroll, head of UK tax at Ernst & Young. A lot of the planning work around this area is to make corporates as competitive as possible, he says.

Many in the tax planning business believe that tax should be a matter of law, not morals. Taxation is no more than legalised confiscation of someone else's money, argues Stephen Edge of Slaughter & May, the law firm. He thinks that companies - if not individuals - are justified in seeking to minimise their bills. He says the incentives to seek savings include peer pressure, responsibility to shareholders and the complex nature of tax law which means that companies sometimes cannot gain the tax reliefs to which they are entitled.

Scepticism about tax morality has a long tradition. Taxes are enforced exactions, not voluntary contributions, said a US judge in 1947. To demand more in the name of morals is mere cant. This kind of scepticism is particularly pronounced in countries that have a history of corruption, occupation by hostile powers or a federal system in which the state is viewed as remote or unaccountable.

But countries where there is a strong sense of patriotism or social solidarity may be less tolerant of tax avoidance. In the aftermath of

September 11 2001, US companies such as Stanley Works, the tookmaker, faced an outcry when they tried to save tax by reincorporating in Bermuda. State treasurers, public pension funds and labour unions lined up to accuse US companies moving offshore of taking the un-American way out.

But it is unusual for companies to face such a broad-based coalition of activists on tax matters. The socially responsible investors who have helped push environmental and social issues up the corporate agenda are generally reluctant to promote greater compliance on tax issues.

The constraint is that promoting a more compliant attitude towards tax planning may damage shareholders' interests by reducing dividends. Some argue that a reputation for honesty on tax matters may bring a company other benefits, such as a good relationship with the government.

But companies that pride themselves on their rectitude on tax matters can become disillusioned if they expect to be well-treated by tax authorities. The more compliant would be expected to get a more sympathetic hearing, says Mr Edge, but you can't guarantee it.

Rob Lake, head of corporate engagement at Henderson Global Investors, thinks taxation poses a challenge to conventional thinking on corporate social responsibility. "Investors increasingly recognise that CSR can bring business benefits, but if people who argue that tax is a matter of CSR mean that companies should pay more tax and the bottom line suffers from an investor's point of view, it poses a real challenge.

What is a matter of concern for investors, though, is whether the way companies manage their tax affairs exposes them to high risks of being challenged by tax authorities, he adds.

Awareness of this kind of tax risk has risen among a significant minority of worldwide companies, according to a survey of tax directors by Ernst & Young. This increased sensitivity reflects a greater emphasis on corporate governance in the aftermath of the Enron and other scandals.

Regulators' determination to increase the transparency of companies' tax affairs was underlined in February by Donald Nicolaisen, the Security and Exchange Commission's chief accountant, who said that sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants and the area of income tax accounting could use more sunlight.

But along with the financial risks associated with an investigation into a company's tax affairs, there may be a threat to its image. This is the hope of a handful of new campaign groups that have been set up to expose and shame large-scale tax avoiders.

John Christensen of the Tax Justice Network argues that companies which care about their reputation cannot condone tax avoidance. The corporate social responsibility agenda is driven by demand for an ethical approach to doing business which should be applied throughout an organisation.

The OECD's Mr Owens thinks that the emergence of non-governmental organisations intent on exposing large-scale tax avoiders could eventually achieve a change in attitude comparable to that achieved on environmental and social issues: Tax is where the environment was 10 years ago.

If tax authorities succeed in changing companies' behaviour, it will be by increasing the risks and costs of tax avoidance. But, at a time when companies are nervous about reputation, a potential public row over abusive tax policies can only heighten the risks. See The pain a silver spoon can cause, page 10

KEY ISSUES IN THE TAX AVOIDANCE DEBATE

* Greater competition and the rise of shareholder value creates an environment in which companies are keen to reduce their tax burdens. Moreover, say activists, a lack of international tax legislation in a global economy has exacerbated the trend.

* Activist investors, who have pushed for corporate changes on environmental and social issues, have generally not called for tax compliance. Commentators say this is because transparency may not guarantee a favourable hearing from tax authorities, and higher tax bills ultimately hit dividends, damaging shareholders' interests.

* The climate of patriotism following the attacks of September 11 and the Iraq war has discouraged companies from reducing tax bills by moving their headquarters to tax havens such as Bermuda.

* Campaigners for transparency in corporate affairs argue that the short-term gains companies can make through complex tax-avoidance techniques are outweighed by long-term reputational risks and costs. .end (paragraph)<<Financial Times UK -- 11/22/04, p. 9>>

[FaGal]

Giving Thanks for Offshoring

Mon Nov 22,10:15 AM ET

By Christopher Farrell

Ah, Thanksgiving. It's a day for giving thanks for family, friends, and food. It's also a good time to reflect on 2004 and think about what we're grateful for when it comes to the economy. (This is BusinessWeek Online, after all.) Record homeownership is on my list. So is an improving job market. Others: Corporate America's durable productivity gains, or New York State Attorney General Elliot Spitzer and his crusade against malfeasance in the financial-services industry.

Still, my No. 1 spot is reserved for the offshoring of skilled-service jobs by American corporations. Yes, you read that right. Americans should be deeply thankful for the emerging trend of American (and European) companies outsourcing software development and other skilled tasks to India, Ireland, the Philippines, and other developing-world havens.

FORCES OF HISTORY.Nothing I have written about over the past year generated as many angry e-mails as my comments defending the free trade of offshoring despite a weak U.S. job market. And nothing that I say now can comfort the millions and millions of Americans looking for work and a paycheck, pounding the pavement, sending out resumes, and scouring the help-wanted ads online. Yet before sending a searing e-mail condemning me to all kinds of damnations, consider the following: Offshoring is a wake-up call to America.

Companies may have gone to India to save money on back-office operations, such as payroll, order fulfillment, and customer service. But they're continuing to do business with Indian high-tech companies because of the quality of the work being done. So, those jobs aren't coming back, and that means we have to create new ones here.

Offshoring is a result of three simultaneous and independent events at this juncture in economic history. First, education levels are rising throughout the developing world -- the payoff from decades of investment. Second, many developing nations have been liberalizing their economies, especially after the collapse of communism toward the end of the 1980s. Last is the information-technology revolution, which made it possible to link developed nations' companies with developing nations' workers -- and do it cheaply.

WANTED: CREATIVE IMPULSE.In general, rising economic prospects in much of the developing world is good, a force for expanding opportunities and eliminating poverty. But the competition for investment money and corporate profits in the global economy is now growing faster than many economists thought possible even a few years ago. To be sure, the rapid integration into the developed-world labor market of some billion workers in China and India is opening up new opportunities to sell cars, washing machines, software, and many other commonplace goods made by American multinationals.

Still, workers overseas will only spend a portion of their low-income earnings on U.S. products. And Americans will continue to lose jobs because of cheap skilled labor overseas. The upheaval is causing havoc all over the U.S., from skilled U.S. programmers in Silicon Valley to textile workers in the American South.

So why cheer offshoring? The main reason is that the offshoring challenge focuses attention on what spurs job creation: The formation of new markets and the meeting of new wants. Joseph Schumpeter, the great economist of entrepreneurship and innovation, captured the dynamic in his magisterial 1942 book, Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: "The fundamental impulse that sets and keeps the capitalist engine in motion comes from the new consumers, goods, the new methods of production or transportation, the new markets, the new forms of industrial organization that capitalist enterprise creates."

SOME CHILDREN LEFT BEHIND? Amar Bhide, professor of business at Columbia University and author of The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses, more recently expressed the same idea: "The long-run prosperity of the West depends on the capacity of its entrepreneurial individuals and firms to create and satisfy new consumer wants."

That means the major institutions of society -- government, education, and business -- need to focus a lot more money and effort on educating the American workforce. For instance, the Bush Administration took a step in the right direction with its No Child Left Behind legislation. But now the Administration needs to back the legislation with enough money -- lots of it. The same goes for fundamental research at America's major universities and institutes.

Sadly, in the name of budget rectitude, many in Congress would like to keep spending increases at the National Institutes of Health (news - web sites) at the rate of inflation and even cut federal support for education. To be sure, the mammoth federal budget deficit makes if hard to call for more investment. Yet, there are many places where spending could be cut to allow for greater investment in human capital. How about cutting back on lush farm subsidies, for starters?

CUT THE RED TAPE. However, it will take time for substantially higher investments in education from the preschool years through university to pay off. In the meantime, America should keep the welcome mat out for educated, skilled immigrants. The American economy is a major beneficiary of the entrepreneurship diaspora that has grown up between Silicon Valley and India, and between and Silicon Valley and Asia.

But in the post 9/11 world, it's getting harder and harder for skilled Chinese and Indian professionals to come here to work and study. While the current bias toward saying no is understandable, the economic price is too high. The Administration could devote more management talent and political capital in getting rid of bureaucratic obstacles that are denying entry to skilled foreign workers.

The way economists look at the world, the efficiency gains of offshoring free up resources in the U.S. The key question is what do we do with those resources. The offshoring challenge says invest in human capital and open borders. That's how we'll generate the good middle-class jobs of the future -- and give more people something to be thankful for.

[FaGal]

Cautionary tale of offshore tax shelters

San Jose Mercury News via NewsEdge Corporation : In U.S. District Court in San Francisco next month, Jerome Schneider is expected to plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to defraud the federal government, and then some.

In hopes of getting a lighter sentence, Schneider's plea will include a detailed confession to the complicated tax shelter scheme he promoted. Last week, he was giving reporters a preview.

Anyone who has income hidden in the Caymans or the Bahamas or wherever and thinks they are going to elude detection from the IRS is greatly mistaken, Schneider said in an interview. They should immediately suspend any belief that this works and set the record straight with the IRS.

Whether Schneider's mea culpa will persuade Judge Susan Illston to go easy on him isn't clear. But anyone who has ever been tempted by promises of offshore tax havens would do well to pay attention to his story.

Credibility created

To get people to buy into his schemes, Schneider said, he worked hard to create the appearance of credibility. He advertised his global wealth-building strategies in in-flight magazines. He penned a litany of books -- including Offshore Money Havens and Global Investing for Maximum Profit and Safety -- that gave him the veneer of a published authority.

Three-day summits -- where people paid thousands of dollars just to learn his techniques -- were held at tony resorts, including the Ritz-Carlton hotels in Cancun, Mexico, and on Maui, Hawaii. For $200 a half-hour, those attending could buy a private consultation with Schneider. For the finishing touch, he hired prominent Americans including Rep. W.J. Billy Tauzin, R-La., and retired Marine Col. Oliver L. North to appear at his events.

They didn't tout Schneider's tax schemes, Schneider said, but they lent credibility to the pitch.

I brought them in to impress the audience, he said.

It worked. In the 1990s, hundreds of wealthy taxpayers paid Schneider and his former partner, Los Angeles attorney Eric Witmeyer, $15,000 to $60,000 each to buy shell banks in places like the Cayman Islands and change the bank's ownership to a foreign conspirator of Schneider's.

Wealthy investors were told they could put money into these shell banks and hide the income it produced from the IRS because the banks were foreign-owned. In fact, such a ruse is illegal, but Schneider said he was able to convince hundreds of people they could fool the IRS this way.

The scheme began to unravel in 1996 when Jack Blum, a former congressional investigator, was invited to attend one of Schneider's summits. He returned steaming about the blatant tax fraud being perpetrated by Schneider and the lack of IRS enforcement.

The IRS began to investigate after Blum wrote a scathing letter to the agency and sent copies to friends in Congress. The investigation took more than five years, and Schneider and Witmeyer were indicted by a federal grand jury in 2002.

One year of parole

Witmeyer quickly agreed to cooperate with authorities and was sentenced last year to one year of parole and a $10,000 fine. Schneider, who this year agreed to plead guilty, could face as many as five years in prison when he is sentenced next month. Under terms of the plea agreement, the government agreed to cap his fines at $100,000, rather than the potential maximum of $350,000.

Also as part of a plea agreement, Schneider gave the IRS his clients' names, addresses, phone numbers and other information. Schneider readily acknowledges that the information he has provided authorities may lead to fines and possible prison time for some of his clients.

Neither the IRS nor court documents say precisely how many people Schneider lured into the world of international tax fraud. Nor do they reveal the amount of money that was hidden from IRS view. (The IRS is prohibited by federal law from discussing individual taxpayers or pending investigations.)

When Schneider was asked whether his clients were tax cheats to start or simply misled, he says there was probably some of both.

Certain clients I felt really knew that this was bogus, that it didn't work, he said. But some of them might not have known. But they should have at least had a hint that it sounded too good to be true. .end (paragraph)<<San Jose Mercury News -- 11/28/04>>

[FaGal]

Tax havens to face new UN code on corruption

INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY via NewsEdge Corporation : The Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and other British territories such as Gibraltar, the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands will come under more pressure to disclose details about bank accounts next year when the new UN Convention against Corruption becomes effective worldwide.

The Netherlands Antilles, Panama, Liechtenstein and other financial bolt holes will also come under mounting pressure, according to officials at the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in Vienna.

The convention is also likely to force changes on Britain's Financial Services Authority. Unlike its counterparts in Switzerland, for instance, it does not name banks it has found housing the proceeds of corruption. An FSA spokeswoman said that it was not involved in the convention and declined to comment.

The International Monetary Fund estimates that something between $600bn (pounds 310bn) and $1,800bn annually - approximately 3 to 5 per cent of the world's GDP - is involved in money laundering. A large slice of this is believed to be the product of corruption.

The World Bank estimates corruption accounts for $1,000bn a year. Famous examples include General Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, who looted $5bn between 1965 and 1997, and General Sani Abacha of Nigeria, who is estimated to have taken $2.2bn in the late 1990s.

Signed by almost all the world's governments Merida, Mexico, on 9 December last year, the convention comes into force when ratified by at least 30 governments. That is expected to have happened before the next UN Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice opens in Bangkok on 18 April. The UNODC acknowledges that it cannot end corruption, but is confident of cutting back the practice.

The convention, which was strongly opposed by those Western governments favouring bilateral action, calls for hallowed legal concepts that have long shielded the corrupt to be cast aside in favour of greater transparency.

The new legal instrument is a victory for developing countries which are showing more enthusiasm for its ratification than EU countries or the US, none of which have so far ratified it.

The treaty says that those suspected of corruption will no longer be able to avail themselves of bank secrecy laws. In future, such laws cannot obstruct the investigation of crimes of corruption.

A major departure in international practice is that the convention commits governments that trace the product of foreign corruption to return the cash to its country of origin, a practice which is slowly being adopted.

It also requires governments to adopt measures respecting, promoting and protecting the freedom to seek, receive, publish and disseminate information concerning corruption.

Illicit enrichment of civil servants is a target. Those who clearly live in a style that he or she cannot reasonably explain in relation to his or her lawful income should be subject to criminal proceedings.

Under the convention, states must also consider measures against bribery and embezzlement in the private sector. Not least, the convention obliges governments to give each other the widest measure of co-operation and assistance.

The convention is likely to add to the regulatory burden in the Channel Islands, where in Jersey alone 150 banks have pounds 150bn on deposit and produce 60 per cent of the GDP.

Bill Ogley, Jersey's chief executive of policy and resources, said: We are putting on to the statute book legislation which will give effect to the convention.

A spokesman for the Isle of Man government, where some 45 per cent of GDP is generated by the financial sector, said: "The Isle of Man has a policy of actively co-operating with international initiatives against financial crime and money laundering.

"A similar approach can be expected in relation to the proceeds of corruption.

The Isle of Man will not tolerate the abuse of our services by financial criminals of any description. .end (paragraph)<<INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY -- 12/19/04>>

[FaGal]

Tax havens and money-laundering
www.iht.com - El Pais Spain - JOAQUÍN ESTEFANÍA - May 3, 2005


The first initiative President George W. Bush sought to impose after the September 11 attacks was that of financial vigilance, i.e. the control of money being handled by terrorists. This was easier said than done, given that much of this money is in tax havens, and there is no legislation to control it. With their usual pragmatism, the Americans made some changes. The Patriot Act placed banks under the obligation to report any "suspicious" activity; and the law reforming the secret services, enacted late last year, contained a clause that allows the government discreetly to inspect international bank transactions to detect supposed terrorist activities.

The laundering of "black" money is not just an illicit financial operation; it also stimulates criminal activities and spurs organized crime. The authorities have never really tried to make public opinion aware of its real significance. Right now, in Spain, the police and judiciary are forging ahead with the so-called "Operation White Whale," aimed at searching out the origins of a vast network of "black money," apparently of largely criminal origin, in the southern coastal resorts of the Costa del Sol. This network might appear to be unusual. But in fact these sorts of money laundering operations are an everyday occurrence.

According to data from the Association for Taxation on Transactions in Aid of Citizens (ATTAC), "the most prudent calculations, though difficult to verify in a field where the law of silence reigns, indicate that the global volume of dealings in money proceeding from the illicit activities of different criminal organizations, what may be called the Gross Criminal Product, amounts to no less than E 800 billion annually, equivalent to 15 percent of world trade."

ATTAC estimates that the quantity of money deposited in tax havens amounts to five trillion dollars, some 2.4 million front companies being registered in these places. Loretta Napoleoni, who has studied the economic theory of terrorism, speaks of a $1.5 trillion system, with this huge sum being made up largely of drug trafficking, but also involving oil, arms, precious stones and human beings.

Faced with this, the Spanish government has just implemented a European Union directive from 2001, with the aim of strengthening the coordination between different professional sectors of society (lawyers, notaries, banks, magistrates) in a bid to close all channels for the laundering of criminal capital.

Resolving the clear contradictions between this directive and the daily conduct of civil society (the professional secrecy or confidentiality of lawyers, notaries, etc.) was the stated objective of a well-attended debate held last week at the Madrid College of Notaries.

Here, the members of the Spanish notarial profession considered the absurd paradox involved in imposing more or less strict vigilance on companies registered in the offices of Spanish notaries, while at the same time allowing the operation - to all legal effects and in complete impunity - of some 100,000 implausible companies registered in Gibraltar, the final traces of which are always lost in some banking institution in the tax havens. Or the existence of front companies in Europe (Isles of Man or Jersey, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Monaco, San Marino, Malta, Cyprus) and in Delaware in the United States, which do not comply with the security and identification requirements normally demanded in most major states, and which have no controls or operative restrictions.

Some days ago, the ATTAC representative in Spain presented to the secretary of state for the economy, David Vegara, a set of proposals for tighter controls: the standardization of national legislation concerning financial crime via the adoption of preventive measures (registry and follow-up, European public control of financial clearing-houses, prohibition of banks accepting funds from tax havens, or opening off-shore subsidiaries); creation of a European agency dealing with tax fraud; lifting of bank secrecy, with the threat of punishment of non-cooperating states; and compulsory transparency by firms regarding the activities, subsidiaries and capital invested in risk countries.

Should these norms not figure among the basic standards of good corporate governance, which has recently been the focus of so much discussion?

[FaGal]

Offshore': A dark vision of shell game
Source: www.charlotte.com, JAMES PRESSLEY, Bloomberg News, August 15, 2005


William Brittain-Catlin, a former investigator for Kroll Associates Inc., nurses a dark vision of capitalism.

Capital, as he describes it, is a protean beast, a "wild animal let out of a cage." The nation state has become "a servant of stateless capital," its citizens suppressed by the "controls of bourgeois capitalist society, in particular the work ethic."

Never mind his hyperventilating style. "Offshore: The Dark Side of the Global Economy" is a convincing description of a perverse world in which capitalism is a giant shell game, where mainstream multinationals shunt assets and liabilities around the globe to evade taxes, hide debt and buy political favor. The fall guys for this scam are shareholders, taxpayers and society at large.

"Offshore" has many strengths, offering a solid primer on how capital slithers in and out of brass-plate subsidiaries as companies ranging from General Electric Co. to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. seek to lower their tax bills.

The author wisely avoids hopscotching from haven to haven, choosing instead to bring offshore finance into focus through the lens of the Cayman Islands. The sun-soaked British dependency proves an effective setting for this dark drama, as Brittain-Catlin combines snippets of the Caymans' seagoing past (Columbus, turtles and Blackbeard the pirate) with its role in the collapses of companies such as Enron Corp. and Parmalat Finanziaria SpA.

In lean prose, the author captures the convoluted story of U.S. energy trader Enron in 20 pages and boils the fraud at Italian food company Parmalat down to nine. While these summations bring no new revelations, they do create crisp snapshots that illustrate how multinationals funnel profits offshore even as they milk governments onshore.

Enron, for example, used hundreds of Cayman subsidiaries to slash its U.S. taxes and hide losses. The Houston-based company also used its clout, including a friendly connection to President George W. Bush, to keep the government from regulating energy- derivatives trading, he says.

Like multinationals the world over, Enron combined offshore freedom with the kind of onshore protection that prompted government bailouts of Chrysler Corp. and the entire U.S. savings and loan sector.

"The modus operandi for the corporation is to pass the cost of its losses onshore onto society and its taxpayers, while the corporation runs off with the profit and parks it offshore," Brittain-Catlin writes.

The same dichotomy lies at the heart of the success of Lakshmi Mittal, the author says. The Indian magnate created the world's biggest steel company -- with mills from Cleveland to Kazakhstan -- through offshore holding companies in tax havens such as the Netherlands Antilles. Yet he built Mittal Steel Co. with the help of politicians like U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and soft loans from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

"As a global strategy, Mittal's onshore ducking and diving - - his exploitation of the differences between states and their fears of competitive disadvantage -- worked wonders," Brittain-Catlin writes.

"Offshore" blames this mess on Western philosophy. Brittain-Catlin traces the roots to Immanuel Kant, who argued that the individual had absolute moral autonomy -- a vital bulwark against the utilitarianism of the age.

Along the way, though, this freedom was subverted in the struggle against absolutism, the author argues. Political freedom suppressed individual rights, forcing us to conform with bourgeois mores. "What was billed as freedom in fact turns out to be a pretext for coercion," he says.

It doesn't take too much imagination to draw a line from the age-old urge for autonomy to a modern German's desire to protect himself from punitive taxation by dragging a suitcase full of cash to a bank in Luxembourg. Unfortunately, Brittain-Catlin muddies the argument with a sometimes-tortuous line of reasoning that leads from Greek mythology to the hypocrisy of the European bourgeoisie.

Equally irritating is the author's failure to offer any solution. He challenges neocons and reformists alike, yet offers no answers of his own.

One thing is clear: Brittain-Catlin rejects the argument that there is a legitimate use for offshore finance. "A distinction cannot be made," he says, "between the use and abuse of offshore tax havens any more than it can be made between the light and dark side of the international financial system."

That distinction, made routinely by bankers and accountants, has worn thin in our age of terrorism, money laundering and corporate fraud. Bankers may bristle at Brittain-Catlin's rhetoric; they cannot ignore his message.

una piccola segnalazione
libro disponibile anche in Italia
http://www.libreriauniversitaria.it/...al_Economy.htm

[FaGal]

Originalmente inviato da FabioGalletti

Offshore': A dark vision of shell game
Source: www.charlotte.com, JAMES PRESSLEY, Bloomberg News, August 15, 2005


William Brittain-Catlin, a former investigator for Kroll Associates Inc., nurses a dark vision of capitalism.

Capital, as he describes it, is a protean beast, a "wild animal let out of a cage." The nation state has become "a servant of stateless capital," its citizens suppressed by the "controls of bourgeois capitalist society, in particular the work ethic."

Never mind his hyperventilating style. "Offshore: The Dark Side of the Global Economy" is a convincing description of a perverse world in which capitalism is a giant shell game, where mainstream multinationals shunt assets and liabilities around the globe to evade taxes, hide debt and buy political favor. The fall guys for this scam are shareholders, taxpayers and society at large.

"Offshore" has many strengths, offering a solid primer on how capital slithers in and out of brass-plate subsidiaries as companies ranging from General Electric Co. to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. seek to lower their tax bills.

The author wisely avoids hopscotching from haven to haven, choosing instead to bring offshore finance into focus through the lens of the Cayman Islands. The sun-soaked British dependency proves an effective setting for this dark drama, as Brittain-Catlin combines snippets of the Caymans' seagoing past (Columbus, turtles and Blackbeard the pirate) with its role in the collapses of companies such as Enron Corp. and Parmalat Finanziaria SpA.

In lean prose, the author captures the convoluted story of U.S. energy trader Enron in 20 pages and boils the fraud at Italian food company Parmalat down to nine. While these summations bring no new revelations, they do create crisp snapshots that illustrate how multinationals funnel profits offshore even as they milk governments onshore.

Enron, for example, used hundreds of Cayman subsidiaries to slash its U.S. taxes and hide losses. The Houston-based company also used its clout, including a friendly connection to President George W. Bush, to keep the government from regulating energy- derivatives trading, he says.

Like multinationals the world over, Enron combined offshore freedom with the kind of onshore protection that prompted government bailouts of Chrysler Corp. and the entire U.S. savings and loan sector.

"The modus operandi for the corporation is to pass the cost of its losses onshore onto society and its taxpayers, while the corporation runs off with the profit and parks it offshore," Brittain-Catlin writes.

The same dichotomy lies at the heart of the success of Lakshmi Mittal, the author says. The Indian magnate created the world's biggest steel company -- with mills from Cleveland to Kazakhstan -- through offshore holding companies in tax havens such as the Netherlands Antilles. Yet he built Mittal Steel Co. with the help of politicians like U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and soft loans from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

"As a global strategy, Mittal's onshore ducking and diving - - his exploitation of the differences between states and their fears of competitive disadvantage -- worked wonders," Brittain-Catlin writes.

"Offshore" blames this mess on Western philosophy. Brittain-Catlin traces the roots to Immanuel Kant, who argued that the individual had absolute moral autonomy -- a vital bulwark against the utilitarianism of the age.

Along the way, though, this freedom was subverted in the struggle against absolutism, the author argues. Political freedom suppressed individual rights, forcing us to conform with bourgeois mores. "What was billed as freedom in fact turns out to be a pretext for coercion," he says.

It doesn't take too much imagination to draw a line from the age-old urge for autonomy to a modern German's desire to protect himself from punitive taxation by dragging a suitcase full of cash to a bank in Luxembourg. Unfortunately, Brittain-Catlin muddies the argument with a sometimes-tortuous line of reasoning that leads from Greek mythology to the hypocrisy of the European bourgeoisie.

Equally irritating is the author's failure to offer any solution. He challenges neocons and reformists alike, yet offers no answers of his own.

One thing is clear: Brittain-Catlin rejects the argument that there is a legitimate use for offshore finance. "A distinction cannot be made," he says, "between the use and abuse of offshore tax havens any more than it can be made between the light and dark side of the international financial system."

That distinction, made routinely by bankers and accountants, has worn thin in our age of terrorism, money laundering and corporate fraud. Bankers may bristle at Brittain-Catlin's rhetoric; they cannot ignore his message.

una piccola segnalazione
libro disponibile anche in Italia
http://www.libreriauniversitaria.it/...al_Economy.htm

Applausi (e richiami) Usa a Tremonti off shore

Diceva Laclos De Choderlos, a proposito delle donne, che non bisogna irritare le vecchie signore perché "la reputazione delle giovani è nelle loro mani". Già, neppure il Bel Paese, come la marchesa di Merteuil, oggi sembra godere di grande stima tra gli attempati (e neo) parrucconi della City londinese. Anzi. Ma in realtà non si tratta di una grande novità. Certo è che gli scandali Parmalat e Cirio non hanno aiutato l' Italia dell' economia e della finanza a ribaltare (o a modificare) il severo giudizio degli osservatori d' oltre Manica. E il vespaio delle polemiche che ha coinvolto Bankitalia per effetto delle Opa di Unipol su Bnl e Bpi su Antonveneta hanno finito per far crollare ai minimi storici le azioni italiane al borsino della rispettabilità (e affidabilità). A picchiare duro non è soltanto l' Economist che si spinge a chiedere le dimissioni di Fazio. È appena arrivato nelle librerie Usa un pamphlet (Offshore, Farrar, Straus and Giroux editore, New York) scritto dal producer della Bbc (e investigatore dell' agenzia Kroll) William Brittain Catlin sul lato oscuro dell' economia globale. L' autore chiama in causa provocatoriamente anche l' ex ministro Giulio Tremonti. Elogiandolo per aver "lanciato l' allarme" tra i suoi colleghi del G7 a combattere le reti off shore. Dimenticandosi però, aggiunge, che in casa sua i soldi, compresi quelli del Made in Italy, viaggiano indisturbati alle isole Cayman (e dintorni).
Il Mondo 7 sett us