Swiss adviser charged in tax fraud tied to UBS

If I were him, I would not advise him to take a vacation to the US anytime soon.

Oh, shock horror!!!!

I bet they are terrified. Really, who cares, as long as they are in Switzerland, I don't really think they should get stressed about the US attorney general or anybody in the US legal system.

The US government need to wake up and realise that collecting taxes from thier citizens is thier job and stop trying to make every other country in the world thier bitches.... bunch of fools.

if i were the US, i'd put some polonium in his tea and make an example of him.

Is he still in business? Probably great free advertising for him!

welcome to the world of private wealth management

You don't think they get paid for putting cash in the Post Finance savings account. do you?

Wonder if the US will try to extradite him using the same "anti-terrorist" legislation they used to haul the Nat West bankers from UK.

No, they cannot. There are no extradition treaties with Switzerland. The Swiss government could even think about it if they wanted but the Swiss legal system will be laughing so hard at the US that they will be rolling around in the isles pissing themselves.

Why not? We'd probably hire him. Like we did with Nazis.

Extradition treaty with USA was signed in 1990 & came into force in 1997, remember the Polanski extradition farce?

I stand corrected....but they did not extradite Polanski right? I was not in the country back then.

One word: ExtraordinaryRendition.

This whole thing is outrageous. The US is getting (even further) out of hand.



yes. i know it's 2 words. that's what makes it funny.

These advisers were actively advising people living in the US
to evade taxes. These were not expats living in Switzerland.
Advisers saying how someone could break the law of another
country should not be viewed positively.

I still think that US citizens living in other countries should not
have to pay taxes back to the US. These are two different
matters.

If they are swiss, they will never be extradited.

Switzerland does not extradite its citizens without the clear consent of the citizen (Art. 25 BV, with exceptions for the international criminal tribunals).

Nice quote from the FOJ's website:

"As a general rule, extradition is also refused for fiscal offences which were committed with the aim of paying lower taxes or custom duties. "

Evade or Avoid? Did they know that it was an illegal act that they were advising? Is it a Swiss advisors responsibility to know all the laws in every other country in the world and all the permutations about them? Did the clients disclose all relevant information to the adviser first? Do the US government make all thier tax legisaltion clear and available to Swiss advisors?

Sorry, but I can't see it. If I while in Switzerland advised somebody in the UK to go and sit down in a pub and have a cigarette, would I be breaking the law?

I'm sorry, but if you have to rely solely on a banking secret in order to make your sorry excuse for "tax planning" work, you know it is evasion and they knew it.

If a tax advisor is worth his salt he sure as hell will have seen to it that what he advises his client is legal, so yes, he has to know the laws in "every country in the world". That is why you have international tax specialists in the first place.

Virtually all tax legislation of almost all countries is available (ok Guam maybe not too up to date), especially for international tax advisors, so no excuse. Furthermore, standing (basic) principle in law: every citizen is deemed to know the law.

An experienced tax advisor will know when the client is leaving out crucial info. On top of that they have a duty to inquire (yes I know its theory and practice is different)

These guys were offering products that wouldn't past scrutiny and the only way they thought to get away with it was to rely on the banking secret. Crappy cowboy tax advisory if you ask me. And they got caught, no mercy.

Evasion. The advisors were telling them they could hide their money tax
free. Yes, they knew 100% what they were doing.

It is not the US government's job to communicate the tax laws of
the US to a tax advisor in Switzerland.