Panama Announces That It Will Concede to OECD Pressure
Posted: Wednesday, July 15, 2009
by Aurelia Masterson
Panama Legal
Executive Summary - As we have been explaining for almost two month Panama will have to concede to change its banking laws for the sake of the OECD. To not do so would mean blacklisting by the other 81 nations in the OECD. Blacklisting could mean the end of being able to have a correspondent bank in any country thus crippling the ability of Panama banks to be able to send and receive wires. They would also not be able to cash checks written from abroad. Panama is way too small to be a lone wolf.
Frederico Humbert, president of Banco General said that the impact of the OECD pressure would make it irresponsible not to take appropriate actions. He did say Banco General was tightening their own requirements already.
Do Not Shoot the Messenger We are passing the news on to you as it develops. Anticipating these developments we moved to Guatemala. We are on your side and are not causing the loss of banking privacy. We are trying to help with solutions instead.
Comments From Other Law Firms In order to repute denials one is likely to hear please check this out for yourself in the English Edition of La Prensa, a major Panama Newspaper:
http://mensual.prensa.com/mensual/contenido/2009/07/10/hoy/english/economy_288.asp
Implications Do not be deceived. These new tax laws are extremely likely to cause capital flight from the tax havens (plural, all of them). Think about it. Sudden capital flight can cause banks in any jurisdiction to become illiquid. This can mean bank failures and liquidations. If you keep reading you will see that we no longer put our clients into any tax haven country.
What to Do First off all move funds out of these tax haven jurisdictions before any treaty is signed. Wire out the lions share of your money fast. Then close the bank account. Do all of this BEFORE any tax treaty is signed or entered into. If you wait you run the risk of wiring out most of your money or closing your account as being treated as a suspicious transaction and having the funds frozen pending an investigation. This could take a long time. If the account is CLOSED BEFORE the treaty start date, the bank account should not be covered by the new treaty and the records would remain under the old bank secrecy laws. To not do so would make the new tax treaty a retroactive law and most countries have a constitution that forbids any retroactive laws.
Banking Privacy Solution The game has changed. It is no longer a question of which country to go to. All the countries are signing these tax treaties for extremely loose information sharing. It is now a question of how to bank privately and securely. The answer is to use trust agreement banking where the bank does not know who you are. The law firm signs on the bank account. The law firm lawyers are from countries that do not tax offshore income so any queries would be unlikely. No nation would be trying to collect any taxes from such a person. You get a general power of attorney for the corporation in blank or made out to whomever you wish. You also have an international trust agreement with the law firm to protect you with. You can have the online banking pass codes. You can get a Visa card tied to the account. We do the banking in Ecuador, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Mexico.
For more information go here: http://www.panamalaw.org/guatemala_trust_agreement_banking.html
Questions welcome always.
-http://www.panamalaw.org
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