The UK HM Revenue and Customs is set to launch a new program which will bombard known tax evaders with extra filing requirements and unannounced financial record inspections, in the hopes of reducing tax non-compliance. On February 22nd the HM Revenue and Customs announced the launch of the Managing Deliberate Defaulters (MDD) program, which will see known tax evaders placed under greater scrutiny of tax authorities for a period of five years. According to the HMRC, the program will apply to individual taxpayers and ... Read More

The Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development is urging its member nations to take greater action against aggressive tax planning schemes, stating that traditional tax audits may not be enough to curb lost revenues and that greater amounts of information are needed to stop overall tax collection loses. On February 1st the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) released Tackling Aggressive Tax Planning Through Improved Transparency and Disclosure, a new report that urges countries to instate higher levels of taxpayer disclosure initiatives, ... Read More

The UK is set to impose harsher penalties on tax offenses committed by UK taxpayers through the use of entities incorporated offshore jurisdictions, in some cases even doubling the fines. However, questions have arisen regarding the potential effectiveness and ultimate motivation behind the revised rules. On January 31st the the UK HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) released a statement stating that from the April 6th 2011 is scheduled to impose a steep hike in the penalties imposed on taxpayers for non-compliance with tax ... Read More

A key member of a London based gang has been jailed for recruiting Eastern European women to cheat the HM Revenue and Customs out of GBP 3.3 million. Ricardas Virokaitis, a 37 year old Lithuanian national residing in London, was jailed on January 26th for five years, after pleading guilty to conspiracy to cheat the public revenue to an amount of GBP 3.3 million. The case prosecutor alleged that Ricardas Virokaitis and his gang recruited women from across Eastern Europe to travel to the ... Read More

Tax evasion, trade mispricing, bribes, and other forms of illicit financial activity caused nearly USD 1.26 trillion to flow from developing nations into wealthier countries in 2008, with the rate growing by an average of 18 percent since the year 2000. Last week Global Financial Integrity (GFI), an independent international body aimed at eliminating the occurrence of illicit cross-border flow of capital, released the latest annual report on the severity of illicit outflows across the developing world. The report stated that the magnitude of ... Read More