US May Target Offshore Tax Evaders

‘Wealthy Americans dodge more than $100 billion a year in taxes by hiding assets in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens, said a senior lawmaker on Friday who is trying to put a stop to it.’

“It’s been described in the media that there’s a tax avoidance scheme involving dividend tax shelters.’

‘…..the probe targets offshore hedge funds doing derivatives deals with investment banks that allow the funds to avoid paying taxes on U.S. stock dividends.

‘Levin; Obama, an Illinois Democrat who is campaigning for his party’s nomination for president; and Sen. Norm Coleman, a Republican from Minnesota, last year introduced a bill to crack down on tax evasion strategies.’

‘It would ……target 34 offshore tax havens, including the Caymans, Bermuda, Grenada, Aruba and the Bahamas.

‘The Treasury Department could slap offending tax havens with the same penalties it places on money laundering centers, under the bill, while would also stiffen penalties in the United States for promoting abusive tax shelters.’

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 10th, 2008 at 8:35 pm and is filed under tax havens, Offshore Banking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.