The "Offshore Leaks" files published have revealed that BNP Paribas and Crédit Agricole may have assisted clients to create offshore companies in the British Virgin Islands, Samoa and Singapore, reports The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
According to ICIJ, BNP Paribas channeled its operations through its Singapore and Hong Kong subsidiaries, whereas Crédit Agricole relied on its Geneva-based Swiss subsidiary.
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Both banks set up companies through their Asian subsidiaries with assistance from Portcullis TrustNet, a service provider that specialises in offshore business and turn-key companies (the famous "quick" companies that can be incorporated within 48 hours) for rich clients claiming to be domiciled in Asia and concealed by nominees.
Experts in the fight against international tax evasion and fraud have all agree that any bank engaging in this kind of activity exposes itself to a serious risk of aiding and abetting tax fraud or even money laundering.
The ICIJ’s files made it possible, reportedly, to trace 56 international business companies – an entity comparable to a trust – that BNP Paribas had set up through its subsidiaries in Jersey and Asia (Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan), in the British Virgin Island, Samoa, and the Seychelles.
BNP Paribas has reportedly claimed that these companies were set up for Asian clients or clients domiciled in Asia in strict accordance with the law, that the bank "knows the identity" of these individuals and has "verified the funds’ origins, uses and purposes".
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By GlobalDataAccording to BNP Paribas, their clients are not attempting to avoid inheritance tax, which is low in Asia, but simply trying to put their money in a safe place in territories where there is business confidentiality so that they can pass it on to their heirs in secret when the time comes.
Accoridng to reports, French banks were among the first to react to pressure from governments and civil society in 2009 by withdrawing from tax havens such as Panama that were seen as overly opaque and unwilling to cooperate with other countries’ tax and legal authorities. But this process of withdrawal has ground to a halt since.
The ICIJ, based in Washington, has obtained more than 2.5 million files detailing offshore transactions and assets held in offshore tax havens.
The hard drive, containing 260 gigabytes of the data, is around one hundred sixty times larger than the two gigabytes of US diplomatic cables made public by Wikileaks in 2010.
The names of thousands of people across the globe have been revealed and their wealth management plans disclosed.
