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As SEC Chair’s Family Grows Rich from Corporate Secrecy Firm, U.S. Named #2 Facilitator of Illicit Money

Courtesy of Pam Martens.

2018 Financial Secrecy Index (Source: Tax Justice Network)

2018 Financial Secrecy Index (Source: Tax Justice Network)

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: February 1, 2018

Yesterday we reported that the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Jay Clayton – the man ostensibly in charge of providing financial transparency to the American people – has tens of millions of dollars in family net worth tied to a Delaware company specializing in providing secrecy to corporate entities. (This actually makes sense for an administration packed with billionaires with lots of tax haven accounts.)

On the heels of that confidence-draining news comes the Financial Secrecy Index for 2018 which names the United States the 2nd worst country for facilitating financial secrecy and illicit money flows, just behind Switzerland. The accompanying report from the Tax Justice Network on the U.S. specifically calls out the state of Delaware, noting the following:

“The U.S. provides a wide array of secrecy and tax-free facilities for non-residents, both at a Federal level and at the level of individual states. Many of the main Federal-level facilities were originally crafted with official tolerance or approval, in some cases to help with the U.S. balance of payments difficulties during the Vietnam War; however some facilities – such as tolerance by states like Delaware or Nevada of highly secretive anonymous shell companies – are more the fruit of a race to the bottom between individual states on standards of disclosure and transparency.”

The report includes an eye-opening memo from 1966 that was “passed by a former State Department operative to a Chase Manhattan bank staffer.” It reads:

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