Six bankers were indicted by the U.S. in an alleged scheme to hide more than $60 million from tax authorities via opaque conduits to new, secret accounts at the private bank.
U.S. prosecutors unsealed an indictment against six bankers accused of helping wealthy Americans hide money offshore via Swiss private bank Ihag, according to a statement on Tuesday. The U.S. also indicted Allied Financial Trust AG, a Swiss consulting firm for wealthy individuals.
Prosecutors allege that Allied and Peter Rueegg, until last week deputy CEO of Ihag bank, and five others were behind a «so-called Singapore solution». The scheme allegedly helped three unnamed «high-value U.S. taxpayer-clients» to conceal assets and income through nominee accounts in Hong Kong and elsewhere.
Stripped Of Identity
The indictment marks the widening of a nearly 15-year tax crackdown, thus far focused largely on Switzerland, to other havens. The Swiss clampdown unearthed a trove of data from Swiss banks such as UBS and more than 50,000 U.S. taxpayers who came clean on their offshore accounts to avoid prosecution. Some, dubbed leavers, sought haven elsewhere.
The three Ihag clients saw their funds «stripped of all indicia of U.S. ownership in order to disguise the true owner of the accounts and facilitate the clients' tax evasion,» justice officials alleged.
Absconded Home
Rueegg returned to Switzerland last week, after being detained in Spain last month on an international arrest warrant, finews.com reported on Monday. The 61-year-old Swiss banker is charged with hiding $50 million in undeclared money through the Singapore scheme.
Another of the defendents is in the top management of the holding company which controls Ihag, a wealth manager founded in 1949 by industrialist and arms manufacturer Emil Georg Buehrle. Ihag itself entered a U.S. program six years ago to come clean on past tax offenses and avoid prosecution, paying $7.5 million – a move which likely shields it in this respect.
Methods Foreshadowed
A third man identified himself as a Swiss whistleblower who in 2017 alleged that Ihag hadn't been totally forthcoming in its settlement, as finews.com reported; the fourth appears to control Allied Financial according to LinkedIn (since taken offline); the fifth man is a former tax consultant based in Hong Kong; the sixth appears to be retired Ihag banker.
The bank's modus operandi is described in the 2015 non-prosecution agreement using examples of Liechtenstein foundations as well as accounts and entities in Panama, Hong Kong, and Singapore. U.S. prosecutors put the sum of U.S.-related accounts held by the bank at $791 million. A spokesman for Ihag didn't comment on the indictment of Rueegg and the other two men it formerly employed.
Asia Conduit
A guilty plea from one of the three clients led to the indictment of the six men: Wayne Chinn, a 79-year-old Vietnamese-American, admitted to hiding more than $5 million over 17 years at Ihag through offshore accounts with nominee names, U.S. officials said.
Chinn and others in 2010 started transferring these funds to Hong Kong, then on to Singapore, where they continued to be managed by Ihag, according to his indictment, which was only unsealed on Tuesday though he pleaded guilty two years ago.
«Round Trip» Scheme
Chinn agreed to forfeit more than $2 million for cheating on his taxes via the «round trip» scheme. This money was repatriated to the U.S. from Singapore. The other two clients, neither of whom are named, are a New York-based hedge fund manager and a resident of North Carolina.
Rueegg and the other five are innocent until proven guilty. If convicted, they face up to five years in prison, while Allied faces financial penalties.
