Brussels, 15/04/2016 (Agence Europe) - The four European member countries of the G20 (Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Italy) plus Spain have undertaken confidentially and automatically to exchange information on the beneficial owners of shell companies established in tax havens.
The German initiative has snowballed. After France, three other European countries have subscribed to Germany's intention to set in place national registers on the beneficial owners of shell companies established in non-cooperative tax jurisdictions, which are themselves to be included on an international blacklist to be drawn up under the aegis of the OECD (see EUROPE 11529). “We commit to establish as soon as possible registers or other mechanisms requiring that beneficial owners of companies, trusts, foundations, shell companies or other relevant entities and arrangements are identified and available for tax administration and law enforcement authorities“, the finance ministers of these five member states declare in a joint letter to the Chinese Presidency of the G20, ahead of the meeting of the 'Finance G20' on the sidelines of the spring meetings of the IMF and the World Bank.
The five countries also undertake to launch a “pilot initiative for automatic exchange of such information on beneficial ownership”, to allow their tax administrations to track the offshore financial mechanisms used by fraudsters and criminals.
On the basis of previous initiatives launched at international level on the exchange of tax information ('BEPS' plan), the ministers take the view that this initiative will be successful only if its scope is global. With regard to this, they hope that the G20 will give the OECD a mandate to create a “new global standard” for the exchange of information on the beneficial owners of shell companies. This standard will cover the range of legal structures concerned and the conditions for this exchange. They also call for international standards to be created for the national registers of the beneficial owners and the interconnection of these.
In the wake of the Panama Papers revelations, (see EUROPE 11524), the Panamanian authorities have reiterated their commitment to work with the international community and reform the country in order to achieve increased transparency of its legal and financial system.
At the European Parliament, the MEPs have decided to set up a new committee of investigation to shed light on the European link in the Panama Papers chain (see EUROPE 11532). Reacting to the initiative of the European G20, the organisation Transparency International recalls that in May 2015, the EU adopted an 'anti-money-laundering' legislative package which already required the member states to establish central registers of beneficial ownership that will be accessible, by the end of 2016, to the national competent authorities and certain individuals with a 'legitimate interest', such as journalists (see EUROPE 11318). Calling for the future registers of the beneficial owners of shell companies based in tax havens to be public, it referred to the example of what the United Kingdom and the Netherlands are already doing in the framework of the fourth 'anti-money-laundering' directive. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)