Tax Havens Pledge to Yield on Secrecy

By DAVID CRAWFORD
Wall Street Journal

The European principalities of Andorra and Liechtenstein pledged to relax their bank-secrecy laws, yielding to international pressure on tax havens to stop shielding the holdings of the rich.

The moves raise the stakes for big tax-haven centers such as Switzerland to take similar steps before the coming meeting of the Group of 20 developed and emerging nations in London. Offshore tax evasion is expected to be a topic at the April 2 summit.

The global financial crisis has encouraged cash-strapped governments to crack down on the offshore industry, which helps wealthy clients evade billions of dollars a year in taxes. The downturn has also exposed alleged financial frauds that flourished under lightly regulated jurisdictions such as Antigua and Barbuda, a tiny Caribbean nation that hosts scandal-plagued Stanford International Bank.

Liechtenstein said Thursday that it will comply with international standards for tax and data sharing established by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

(More here.)