This sounds like a good start

Bloomberg reported today that 14,700 Americans have disclosed offshore accounts subject to taxation. That’s about 28% of the 52,000 the IRS was originally interested in, but hey, it’s a start.

We’re pretty sure that we don’t have any PNCP member with offshore accounts created for tax-evasion purposes, but we are looking into it to be positive. OK, maybe some of our people, and maybe some contributors, have offshore accounts, but they’re completely legitimate–really.

Really, they are.

Funny how we haven’t heard a single word from the URW about any of this.

Swiss Banks Take a Baby Step

PNCP applauds the Swiss government and UBS bank for taking initial steps to provide information on US citizens suspected of tax evasion.  However, it is only the beginning.  “Serious, systematic tax evasion should not be protected by bank secrecy,” said UBS Chairman Kaspar Villiger, but he did NOT say anything to indicate that he believed stock fraud, ponzi schemes, and just plain-old theft are crimes whose benefactors should be exposed.

OK, so Swiss banking is big, over $2 trillion. Maybe it would truly suck to be them if they only handled legally-gotten gains. What’s the destruction of a telecom giant, or an airline pension fund among friends?

PNCP Supports Going After Tax Havens

Maybe it’s time that the Swiss start focusing on skiing and chocolate, and for the Caymans to get back to being a quaint little scuba/snorkel destination. Last October, we envisioned flotillas of corporate jets carrying poly-wrapped bundles of Ben Franklins, reminiscent of Colombian goodie-bags, queuing to land at Flughafen Zurich or Owen Roberts Airport. Hell, most of the Cayman “banks” are just little one room offices anyway. It’s not like cutting of the flow of America tax-sheltered cash is going to result in the layoffs of thousands of bank tellers.

Our message to the current administration is “Go for it! Bring those bags of bucks home.”