Offshore Finance and First World Sized Scandals
Feb 08
Posted: under Uncategorized.
The a previous article we outlined the history of Offshore finance that all attorneys in Belize need to understand to better serve their customers in these financially difficult times. This article is Part Two and covers some of the recently financial scams that have been perpetrated in developed nations.
A US citizen was recently indicted with swindling well-to-do, refined and competently advised first world investors around $65 billion US. His companies were situated not “offshore”, but right in the United States and England. He was supposed to be regulated by the SEC and no one did anything. These include the IRS, the domestic investigation department and the Central Intelligence Agency who were all supposed at the time to be following “suspicious” banking actions and money laundering activity based on the formerly pasted Patriot Act. It can be said that at least $65 B of dishonestly obtained cash, were thus “laundered” in front of their face.
Allen Stanford has been the poster child for “offshore” scams. However, only his bank was based in Antigua and his main financial unit was actually based in Houston. Further, being a US citizen, the US authorities had extra territorial jurisdiction over him anywhere in the world he went. He still worked with impunity right under, from and with, the US, American citizens and international investors. His associates were even in Belize soliciting clients at one point in time, but luckily, the small number of approached Belizeans were a bit more financially savvy due to their offshore exposure.
Also Texas based, was the large Enron that was the model of how to fake bookkeeping records. Some other instances of imaginative accounting include now reputable companies like Xerox, AOL, Bristol Myers Squibb, Duke Energy (once an investor in BECOL/BEL), Freddie Mac, Halliburton (of Iraq/Afghan war fame), Kmart, Merck, Merril Lynch, Qwest, Tyco International, Worldcom, Chiquita and AIG. These were all perpetrated to a large extent by one of the following accounting firms: Arthur Andersen & Deloitte & Touche. Though some are no longer existent in their former states due to the scams they participated or rather, structurally advised.
Then there was the English trader that caused loss to the Russian Mafia laundering billions through the (then) respected Bank of New York. Bear Sterns and Lehman Bros. BCCI and Northern Rock WAMU and Bear Sterns are just a few of the more well known fiascoes. Their products included subprime mortgages and reverse mortgages and the list goes on.
This history would help all attorneys in Belize or Belize lawyers better explain why the Offshore industry in companies like Belize should not suffer undue regulation since financial scams can be and have been implemented in all countries of the world.
