[Closed] The Panama Papers.

I must have missed the bits in that report about paedophiles and lizards.

Of course he's not far off the mark.. people just prefer to put their fingers in their ears cos they're uncomfortable with the news that their creepy uncle has been found with 1000s of indecent images of children on his laptop (metaphorically speaking)

It's hardly news is it?
Rich people using offshore accounts to hide their wealth, and keep it away from Government tax authorities. I thought that was pretty common knowledge.

Powerful people have dodgy dealings with secretive bank shock horror probe.
Well colour me surprised.

Silly me, I'd forgotten all about the fact that between them, the City of London and Jersey deal with most of the world's offshore banking.

Bloody handy things Crown Dependencies.

Just don't mention arms deals or Saudi Arabia...

(Or the other thing Jersey is famous for)

Or the other thing Jersey is famous for

Cows?

Dodgy bank helps dodgy people hide their dodgy money....

This surprising how?

[quote=jivehoneyjive ].
(Or the other thing Jersey is famous for)

[img] [/img]

What's he done?

Milk?....Toffee?.......Bergerac?.

Or the other thing Jersey is famous for

Cows?

.

That's what they want you to think Jersey is famous for...

Royals?

[quote=jivehoneyjive ](Or the other thing Jersey is famous for)sleeves?

Keeping nets for the scouse?

OP. Curious as to why you think this has anything to do with the stuff @jive posts. This is a straightforward leak of legal documents which shows (allegedly) Putin has hidden a lot of money, the President of Iceland used an offshore trust to disguise a shareholding in his wife's business, Lionel Messy and his father have an offshore trust for image rights (as I certain do many EPL players). I'd wager Russell Brand has a similar arrangement for his youtube channel earnings for example. None of this is a great surprise.

If you have a lot of money/assets its legal to put them into an offshore trust. Happens all over the world. They are then sheltered from inheritance tax, protected in a divorce or just wayward family members squandering them.

Just because they're legal, doesn't necessarily make them right, or.... Moral.

If you have a lot of money/assets it's legal to put them into an offshore trust

... always assuming you are declaring your income to the authorities for tax purposes of course...

...and it seems that money laundering and hiding bribery payments may also not be legal.

It's hardly news is it?

Nah, it'll all be forgotten about this time tomorrow.

Just because they're legal, doesn't necessarily make them right, or.... Moral.

Define moral

There are hundreds of millions of people whose religion reckons that sex before marriage, abortion and homosexuality are all deeply immoral - what should be done about them?

[i]"Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others." - Marx[/i]

relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical:

There is one definition for you fanny, why am I not surprised you come rushing to defend the indefensible.

What I don't understand is what makes people crave such enormous wealth?

It seems there are plenty of examples of illegal tax evasion and fraud amongst the 11million doccuments.
These guys scumbags are only the 4th largest such firm, imagine what the rest get up to

Thread title is a bit of a tabloid click bait effort. Money laundering and tax evasion are not evidence of VIP child abuse rings. And not even news.

Bravo to Drac for a very clever reply earlier btw 😀 Closer link to a @jive story than the OPs link!

"Western politicians have huffed and puffed about clamping down on offshore havens but in reality their collective breath would not have knocked over a little piggie’s straw house let alone bastions of vested interest. It is thanks to investigative reporters, whistleblowers and unprecedented international media collaboration that the matter is being

A part of the problem is the distinction between crooks and non-crooks - from the Guardian:

Are all people who use offshore structures crooks?
No. Using offshore structures is entirely legal. There are many legitimate reasons for doing so. Business people in countries such as Russia and Ukraine typically put their assets offshore to defend them from “raids” by criminals, and to get around hard currency restrictions. Others use offshore for reasons of inheritance and estate planning.

I don't know about you, but someone who uses an offshore structure to avoid paying inheritance tax sounds like a crook to me. A lot of this is about working within the letter of the law, but against the spirit of the law.

When the rich can hire much better accountants and lawyers than the governments can, the distinction between legal and illegal becomes almost meaningless.

Mods, since you've locked the thread with the useful thread title, and the Panama papers are going to be in the news cycle and worthy of comment for a week or so, if you're determined that this is the thread in which it is done would you mind retitling the thread to something relevant please?

And, in answer to MSPs post on that thread

MSP - Member
Wonder how many of our own rich and elites this will hit, The focus initially seems to have been the traditional enemies of the west, Putin and middle east dictators, but now some "westerners" seem to be being named.

Given the organisations involved on analysing the data and publishing stories from it, they would be hunting out "western" targets long before the usual suspect list of the putins and despots of the world. If the data was rammed with cabinet ministers and senators those are the names we'd see first.

Stoner +1, I avoided this thread as its title suggested bullying.

The Guardian are reporting this as though it's almost entirely about Putin, although even they admit his name does not appear anywhere in any of the documents.

Not to say I'm a Putin supporter, but it's very poor sensationalist tabloid-esque nonsense. Actual heads of state mention explicitly in the documents get a cursory mention, but the rest reads like anti Russia/ Putin propaganda...

The thing about reporting this stuff as mainly about Putin is that he and his mates couldn't give a *. They will ensure it's barely reported in Russia, and even if it is they'll just say that they have done an investigation and no wrongdoing was found.
No more that a shrug and a "* you" is required.

(reported MSPs post so mods see it)

Bravo to Drac for a very clever reply earlier btw Closer link to a @jive story than the OPs link!

Cheers.

if you're determined that this is the thread in which it is done would you mind retitling the thread to something relevant please?

[s]We're not determined of anything so I'll think we'll just leave it, if that's Ok with you.[/s]

Spotted the closed thread now, I had no idea what you meant, so I'll alter the title.

As I understand it Putin is sly enough to have nothing in his own name, If there's any thing of his devolved fortune left untouched I suspect there maybe more sanctions on the way.

It's hard to take any politician serious on this one tho, Cameron's own inheritance was stashed offshore for him.

Money laundering and tax evasion are not evidence of VIP child abuse rings. And not even news

Although not as emotive a VIP child abuse rings, money laundering and tax evasion are just as illegal and actually take place in the real, non-tabloid, world.

So this IS news despite all the cynical put downs on STW.

I just hope somebody takes a good look at these documents and if anything illegal can be proved, they have a good try at taking the *unts down.

Although I won't hold my breath.

Apparently this is 40 years worth of docs relating to dodgy dealings. I reckon they will drip feed this out over the next few months and there is plenty more dirt to come.

If you have a lot of money/assets its legal to put them into an offshore trust.

So far only MPs named are Tory's, and lots of donors to all parties.

Cameron might be worried that is empty promises to clamp down have been exposed as blatant lies, I'm sure he's worried that further revelations could damage he and his privileged chums, still at least one name on the list might have cheered him up....

the only British politicians so far named are Lord Ashcroft, Tory peer Baroness Pamela Sharples and former Conservative MP Michael Mates

That'd be the same Lord Ashcroft that grew up and lived in the not even remotely offshore-ish Belize, and had the bulk of his assets and business activities there?

I tell you what, these revelations are mind blowing! 😀

According to wiki he only spent a few years in Belize, born and educated in the UK, it seems he infact owns most of Belize
Holds a dual British passport and spent at least five years saying he was registered in the UK, whilst he used this company to create shell companies to hide his wealth from the UK tax inspector...

I can't believe there's surprise about Putin's inclusion in the list.

For a man who claims to own very little it's been well known for quite some time that his late 20 something daughter (supposedly a student / researcher) has controlling interests in investments worth in excess of $1B.

Craig Murray has an interesting point to make, it will be interesting to see what comes out in the future.

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/

"The leak is being managed by the grandly but laughably named “International Consortium of Investigative Journalists”, which is funded and organised entirely by the USA’s Center for Public Integrity. Their funders include

Ford Foundation
Carnegie Endowment
Rockefeller Family Fund
W K Kellogg Foundation
Open Society Foundation (Soros)

among many others.
Do not expect a genuine expose of western capitalism. The dirty secrets of western corporations will remain unpublished.

Expect hits at Russia, Iran and Syria and some tiny “balancing” western country like Iceland. A superannuated UK peer or two will be sacrificed – someone already with dementia"

Im not a huge fan of the Guardian, but I hardly see them being played like puppets if there's data in front of them to get stuck into.

meh, all those funders and their contributions are listed on their website, which puts them several steps above the tax havens and their patrons

theyve also investigated and been quite critical of some of their own funders, including Soros