Credit Suisse Faces Tax Probe Over Undeclared Accounts

Published by Bloomberg – 22nd November 2016

When Credit Suisse AG pleaded guilty in 2014 to helping Americans cheat on their taxes, it promised to help the U.S. root out suspicious accounts. Now, U.S. investigators want to know why the Swiss bank neglected to tell them about $200 million in undeclared assets owned by an American client, according to people familiar with the matter.

The client, Dan Horsky, a citizen of the U.S., U.K. and Israel, pleaded guilty Nov. 4 to conspiring to defraud the Internal Revenue Service. He has been cooperating for more than a year with investigators examining whether the bank helped clients with ties to Israel evade U.S. taxes, said five people who weren’t authorized to discuss the case publicly.

Published by Straits Times – 1st November 2016

SINGAPORE – On the second day of the first 1MDB-related trial, revelations emerged about the lengths to which ex-BSI banker Yeo Jiawei and his former supervisor Kevin Swampillai went to hide their “secret profits” as investigations by the Singapore authorities intensified.

Published by Reuters – 28th October 2016 

Swiss bank UBS (UBSG.S) said Hong Kong’s securities regulator is investigating its role as sponsor of certain unnamed stock market listings in the city, with the intention to start unspecified action against the bank and some of its employees.

The disclosure by UBS, released with its third-quarter financial results, made it the first major bank to say it was being probed since Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) introduced tougher rules for listing sponsors. UBS said the watchdog had informed it of its actions this month.

Published by Reuters – 11th October 2016

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has asked Swiss wealth manager Falcon Private Bank Ltd to cease operations in the city state over lapses related to handling fund flows with scandal-hit Malaysian sovereign fund 1MDB.

The move comes after MAS – Singapore’s central bank – in May ordered the shutdown of Swiss private bank BSI and subsequently charged people in connection with the probe and froze assets linked to 1MDB. It also imposed financial penalties on DBS Bank and the Singapore branch of UBS AG for breaches of AML requirements.

Published by Finews Asia – 11th October 2016

Singapore’s financial regulator has penalised banks for doing business with Malaysian state fund 1MDB, which is at the center of a billion-dollar corruption and money-laundering investigation. UBS, the world’s largest private bank, is guilty of 13 violations.

The Swiss bank’s money-laundering breaches include deficiencies in taking on new accounts, weaknesses in corroborating the source of funds, inadequately scrutinizing customers’ transactions and activities, and failure to file suspicious transaction reports on time, the Monetary Authority of Singapore said in a statement.

Published by The Straits Times – 21st September 2016

JAKARTA – Wealthy Indonesians have stashed about US$250 billion (S$340 billion) worth of assets overseas, of which a whopping 80 per cent are kept in Singapore.

This was revealed by Indonesia’s Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati on Tuesday (Sept 20) during a judicial review of her country’s Tax Amnesty Bill.