by Rick Lowe
The French and German's seem to be leading the Brits and American's on a path to destroy The Bahamas international banking industry while they are more egregious, exhibiting rank hypocrisy.
Here's what The Economist had to say in their March 28th edition:
America is not the only rich nation Mr Sharman tested. He tried to open anonymous shell companies and bank accounts 45 times across the world. These were successful in 17 cases, of which 13 were in OECD countries. One example was Britain, where in 45 minutes on the internet he formed a company without providing identification, was issued with bearer shares (which have been almost universally outlawed because they confer completely anonymous ownership) as well as nominee directors and a secretary. All was achieved at a cost of £515.95 ($753).
In other cases Mr Sharman formed companies by providing no more than a scanned copy of his driving licence. In contrast, when trying to open accounts in Bermuda and Switzerland, he was asked for documentation such as notarised copies of his birth certificate. “In practice OECD countries have much laxer regulation on shell corporations than classic tax havens,” Mr Sharman concludes. “And the US is the worst on this score, worse than Liechtenstein and worse than Somalia.”
Read the entire article entitled, Haven Hypocrisy, here…
George Bush, for all his sins, called the dogs off of this campaign, yet Barack Obama, with his "Everybody Wins" slogan, is surely trying to make losers out of us.
