German state buys Swiss data to track tax frauds-FT - Reuters UK
BERLIN, July 14 |
BERLIN, July 14 (Reuters) - Authorities in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia have bought a CD from Switzerland containing wealthy Germans' bank details as part of a drive to identify tax evaders, the Financial Times Deutschland said in its online edition on Saturday.
The CD contains the names and bank details of some 1,000 wealthy Germans who are customers of the Zurich branch of Coutts, the private banking arm of Britain's Royal Bank of Scotland best known as banker to Britain's Queen Elizabeth, the paper said, citing inside information.
It can be assumed that these customers avoided paying large amounts of tax, the paper said.
"We are aware of the continued media speculation regarding a potential breach of client data secrecy at Coutts," a spokeswoman for Coutts said.
"Following thorough investigation, we have no evidence to suggest any such breach has taken place," she added.
The state finance ministry neither confirmed nor denied that it had purchased the CD.
"We have no indication that this is correct," said Mario Tuor, spokesman for the Swiss governmental unit tasked with negotiating the tax dispute.
The origin of the CD was not clear but in 2010 several German states including North Rhine-Westphalia said they had bought CDs containing Swiss banking data from whistleblowers to help identify German tax evaders. This led thousands of Germans to declare their financial holdings to avoid risking jail sentences.
North Rhine-Westphalia paid 3.5 million euros for the CD, according to the FTD, in a move which threatens to further sour already strained relations between the two countries on tax issues.
Germany reached an agreement with Switzerland last September to levy taxes on German assets in Swiss bank accounts that is due to come into effect next year pending German parliament approval. As part of the deal Germany will no longer be allowed to buy CDs containing tax data.
"We cannot agree to the planned tax agreement with Switzerland as it stands and without the approval of states ruled by the Social Democrats and Greens, it cannot come into effect," said Norbert Walter-Borjans, finance minister of the North Rhine-Westphalia, which is run by Social Democrats.
"It is therefore only logical that we don't need to act as if the agreement already applied," he told Reuters.
German tax authorities raided Credit Suisse clients and French officials searched the homes of UBS employees this week, deepening the crackdown on foreigners hiding money in Swiss offshore accounts to dodge taxes.
Walter-Borjans said the raids showed it was necessary to obtain information by purchasing CDs in order to uncover tax evasion. (Reporting by Michelle Martin, Catherine Bosley and Tom Kaeckenhoff; writing by Michelle Martin; editing by Keiron Henderson)
GE lands first deal as US firms descend on Myanmar - Reuters
(Reuters) - General Electric Co (GE.N) secured a medical equipment deal with two hospitals in Myanmar on Saturday, becoming the first U.S. company to restart business in the long-isolated country since Washington eased sanctions this week.
U.S. firms are wasting no time since U.S. President Barack Obama announced the issue of general licenses on Wednesday to allow investment and financial services.
GE was the first to move, agreeing through its local dealer to provide X-ray machines for cardiology and topography to two private hospitals in Myanmar.
The deal was announced on Saturday during a U.S. business trip to Myanmar, where investors are hoping to tap into everything from infrastructure and financial services to information technology, oil and gas.
Wary of being left behind by Asian companies, 70 people from 37 U.S. firms were on hand to scope opportunities in the once secretive state.
Although the GE deal through local partner, Sea Lion Co Ltd, was relatively small at approximately $2 million, the company has big plans for Myanmar, where the government has vowed to boost healthcare spending and tackle chronic power shortages.
"We're now good to go," GE's chief executive for ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Stuart Dean said in an interview on the sidelines of a forum of U.S. businesses in Siem Reap, Cambodia on Friday.
"Before it was a grey area, we didn't know if this was permitted or not. We would prefer it this way, to see the end user. If we gave a hospital 60 days to pay, was that financing and breaking sanctions? We weren't sure, but now that's covered by the licenses, so we're very positive."
Myanmar's 15-month-old quasi-civilian government is navigating an ambitious path to develop a resource-rich but desperately poor country that wilted under 49 years of military rule and sanctions, which have largely kept U.S. firms at bay.
Major U.S. companies dealing there under the embargoes were Chevron (CVX.N), which set up there before sanctions were put in place, and Caterpillar (CAT.N), which has sold bulldozers and excavators in Myanmar through an independent dealer.
POWER STRUGGLE
The licenses issued to U.S. companies cover provision of financial services and a reporting requirement and detailed disclosures to promote transparency in a notoriously corrupt country, a move Obama said was to provide "immediate incentives to reformers".
One of the biggest challenges for Myanmar's government, and of concern for many investors, is its power outages. Myanmar has an outdated grid and three-quarters of its 60 million people do not have regular access to electricity. Although it generates hydro-power, most of its output is exported to its neighbors.
Dean said GE was working fast to try to agree a deal to supply Myanmar with two 25-megawatt gas turbines, which the government promised to the public in response to protests in several cities. It was also seeking to upgrade old GE technology sold to Myanmar before the imposition of sanctions.
"We continue to negotiate this, discussions are ongoing, but unlike healthcare equipment it's complicated, you have to connect to the grid and you need gas," Dean said.
"There's an urgency, we're working it hard, Myanmar's working it hard, but they're inundated with other proposals and in terms of people who understand how to negotiate energy deals, they're limited."
Now that financing was permitted, the world's biggest jet engine and electric turbine maker would eventually look to aircraft leasing there as Myanmar prepares to build a new airport outside the commercial capital Yangon.
Dean said the country was also interested in upgrading Myanmar's decrepit railways and fleet, which was not GE technology, but the company might provide signaling equipment.
With a request to open an office in Yangon still pending, progress would be slow and the company, he said, would limit its work in the country for now.
"We still have no feet on the ground. We're looking to hire by the end of the year, it's one step at a time," he said. "The real focus is, let's do healthcare and electricity well."
(Reporting by Martin Petty Siem Reap, Cambodia; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)
France's Hollande: Peugeot must renegotiate layoff plan - Reuters
Thomson Reuters is the world's largest international multimedia news agency, providing investing news, world news, business news, technology news, headline news, small business news, news alerts, personal finance, stock market, and mutual funds information available on Reuters.com, video, mobile, and interactive television platforms. Thomson Reuters journalists are subject to an Editorial Handbook which requires fair presentation and disclosure of relevant interests.
NYSE and AMEX quotes delayed by at least 20 minutes. Nasdaq delayed by at least 15 minutes. For a complete list of exchanges and delays, please click here.
Scottish football weighs up future - Football
Published: 14 Jul 2012 - 08:17:13
Scottish football woke up to the dawn of a new era on Saturday after Rangers newco were voted into the Third Division of the Scottish Football League.
At an SFL meeting at Hampden, 29 of the 30 lower league clubs accepted the Ibrox club as an associate member of the SFL while 25 clubs voted in favour of placing them into the bottom tier, despite Scottish Football Association chief executive Stewart Regan claiming that decision would bring a financial catastrophe and a "slow, lingering death" of the game.
Soon after the vote was announced Scottish Premier League side Inverness Caledonian Thistl'`s directors convened an emergency board meeting for Saturday to consider the "very serious financial implications" of Charles Green's newco being voted into the bottom tier.
Inverness chairman Kenny Cameron said: "There will now inevitably be serious consequences for the game in Scotland. We have all, as clubs, accepted the views of our stakeholders in making the initial judgement to uphold sporting integrity.
"All clubs will now have to live with the repercussions of this decision. Scottish football was at a crossroads today in terms of what was on the table for all clubs regarding reorganisation, financial distribution and a road map that would have taken the game forward.
"But this has now been thrown into disarray by this decision. This is a sad day for all clubs in Scotland."
David Longmuir, SFL chief executive, said he was "comfortable" with the outcome of the vote and that the decision from the SFL clubs was taken with the sport's best interests at heart.
He said: "I'm comfortable that the Scottish Football League made a very, very decisive decision that was based on sporting fairness which is the fundamental principle of the Scottish Football League."
Whilst there was speculation over the formation of an SPL 2 to keep Rangers close to the top flight, with the prospect of the newco being invited straight into the SPL also mooted, Green and Rangers manager, Ally McCoist, appeared to accept the Govan club's fate.
Green said: "The people who brought shame on this great club are no longer part of it and everyone at Rangers is focused on rebuilding the club on top of a solid financial foundation."
Related Rangers News
Drogba arrives in China to heros welcome - Football
Published: 14 Jul 2012 - 06:16:54
Ivory Coast striker Didier Drogba was given a hero's welcome as he arrived in China Saturday to start a two-and-a-half year contract that is expected to make him one of football's highest-paid players.
Hundreds of fans, many clad in "Drogba 11" shirts, greeted the former Chelsea star at Shanghai's Pudong airport, some carrying bouquets of flowers and others brandishing his name in English on placards.
"Let me tell you something, now we have Drogba, Shanghai is not a common city anymore, Shanghai is a world mega-city now," one fan, Lu Xiaobo, said after Drogba walked past the crowd, signing autographs and shaking hands.
The 34-year-old has signed with Shanghai Shenhua on a deal that Chinese and British media have said is worth 200,000 pounds ($314,000) a week, which would make him the highest-paid player in China and in the top bracket globally.
He is the latest in a fast-growing number of foreign stars to have been lured to China on enormous salaries that are typically funded by Chinese business titans.
Drogba will join French striker Nicolas Anelka, who signed with Shenhua in January on a deal believed to be nearly as high.
The fearsome strikers will work under former Argentine coach Sergio Batista, who joined the club in May. Shenhua is bankrolled by high-profile video-game tycoon Zhu Jun.
In the far south of the country, World Cup-winning coach Marcello Lippi is at the helm of ladder-leading Guangzhou Evergrande, and Nigerian striker Ayegbeni Yakubu has just signed with cross-town rival Guangzhou R&F.
Shanghai Shenhua play Beijing Guoan on Saturday night at home in what is regarded as one of the biggest fixtures on the Chinese domestic football calendar.
Drogba will not play on Saturday night but is expected to appear on the pitch to greet fans. He is also due to hold a press conference on Saturday afternoon.
Drogba will likely play his first game for his new side next week when Shenhua play Changchun away in the Chinese FA Cup, according to local press reports.
He and Anelka face an uphill battle to redeem their new club's season. Half way through, Shanghai Shenhua sit just one point off the bottom of the 16-club Chinese Super League.
Drogba may be approaching the twilight of his career but he showed he is still a lethal striker with a match-winning role for Chelsea in the Champions League final in May.
The imposing target man said when the Shanghai deal was signed last month that he was excited about coming to China.
"I am looking forward to a new challenge and to experiencing a new culture, and I am excited about the new developments in the Chinese Super League," he said.
"I (also) hope to help promote Chinese football around the world and further improve the links between China and Africa."
Drogba scored 157 goals in 341 appearances for Chelsea after moving from Marseille in 2004.
The Chinese Football Association believes the domestic game, which has endured years of corruption and repeated failures by the national team, is set to take off thanks to the infusion of expensive talent such as Drogba.
"The high-level world-class players and coaches will be able to provide a learning opportunity to our domestic players and coaches," CFA spokesman Dong Hua told AFP.
"I hope our coaches and players can improve through this exchange and enhance the level of Chinese football as a whole."
But critics say the money is being wasted, with the foreigners sometimes getting paid more than the salaries of the rest of the players combined, while grassroots football is being ignored.
Related Chelsea News
Gujarat minority wing coordinator dumped by RSS - MSN India
Ahmedabad: In what may be assumed as a cleanup operation, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) divested Yasin Ajmerwala of his responsibility as the Coordinator of Rashtrawadi Muslim Andolan (RMA).
Sources maintained that Ajmerwala was responsible for the skull cap fiasco in Chief Minister Narendra Modi's Sadbhavana mission last year, which had raised a huge controversy, effectively denting the desired impact of the glamourous fast fest of Gujarat chief minister.
Ajmerwala is also known to be close to banished BJP leader and RSS Pracharak Sanjay Joshi, the sources within BJP said.
When contacted, Ajmerwala denied having anything to do with the skull cap controversy and said that the party would have thrown him out long back if he had any link to the incident. "I am still continuing as a member of state BJP's minority cell," he said.
He attributed this to internal feuds of RMA. However, when asked further, he admitted that he has been in touch with Sanjay Joshi. "He is a leader of high stature and nurtures nationalistic ideology. It is no crime to be in touch with him," he added.
Source: www.indiatoday.in
0 Responses to "German state buys Swiss data to track tax frauds-FT - Reuters UK"
Post a Comment