U.S. Senate panel to question Swiss banker, secrecy

Reuters ^ | 04 Mar 2009 | Kevin Drawbaugh

[BGHater]

The sanctity of the secret Swiss bank account -- an icon of global finance -- is under growing pressure in a tax investigation due to come into public view on Wednesday at a U.S. congressional hearing.

Senator Carl Levin, a long-time foe of offshore tax havens estimated to deprive the U.S. government of $100 billion in annual revenues, will convene the hearing before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations that he chairs.

Levin will grill Mark Branson, a top officer at UBS AG, over a tax case in which the U.S. government wants the giant Swiss bank to disclose the names of thousands of rich U.S. clients suspected of dodging U.S. taxes.

The Michigan lawmaker told reporters in a briefing on Tuesday that the hearing will also focus on a U.S.-Swiss tax treaty he described as having "very, very limited value." He said, "You can't rely on the Swiss. That's the bottom line."

Branson will appear before the Senate panel for the first time since UBS last month acknowledged responsibility for helping U.S. clients conceal assets from the U.S. government, which is cracking down on tax dodgers with offshore accounts.

UBS, the world's largest banker to the rich, also agreed last month to pay a $780 million fine, and to identify some U.S. clients, in a legal agreement that resolved criminal fraud charges that it helped wealthy Americans evade taxes.

U.S. authorities, fearing that the agreement might yield very few names, have since filed a lawsuit against UBS seeking information on as many as 52,000 undeclared accounts.

UBS has said it will fight the lawsuit, arguing that the information sought by the United States is protected by Swiss financial privacy laws. Branson is chief financial officer of UBS Global Wealth Management and Swiss Bank.

[BGHater]

See Also:
'"Speaking at his monthly press conference in Downing Street, Brown said: "We want the whole of the world to take action. That will mean action against regulatory and tax havens in parts of the world which have escaped the regulatory attention they need. The changes we make will have to apply to all jurisdictions around the world."'

Brown targets Switzerland in global tax haven crackdown[UK]

A Global Solution.

[pepsionice]

Its a curious meeting. Out of 100 senators...I’d make a pretty good bet that between themselves or their wives...eighty of them have something hidden in Swiss banks. If I go the top fifteen friends of each senator...the majority of them have money hidden in Swiss banks. When you examine a number of the players who came with Clinton to DC in the 1990s....several of them were rumored to have Swiss accounts or were acting as delivery vehicles to get money there.

So...I’m curious how they can make a big deal about this and then play soft.

I saw a forum last year discussing the idea of Russia getting into this hidden money asset management...with the Russian mafia acting as a clearing house and basically to just forgo any discussion of a legitimate government behind the banks. You’d have to find an awful lot of trust...to believe this might work.