Should Switzerland fear Anglo-Saxon trusts?

Trust factor
Should Switzerland fear Anglo-Saxon trusts?

by Matt Allen, swissinfo.ch

September 5, 2013 – 11:00

Having surrendered its treasured banking secrecy in the war against tax evasion, Switzerland is refusing to concede more ground until trusts and other opaque offshore structures give up as many secrets as private banks.

Switzerland has been accused in some quarters of employing time wasting tactics, but even independent tax reform campaigners concede that the trust model has got off relatively lightly in the recent welter of anti-tax haven legislation.

“So far there has been a lack of equality between [clamping down on] Anglo-Saxon varieties of secrecy and typical banking secrecy,” Markus Meinzer, a German-based consultant for the British-based NGO Tax Justice Network, told swissinfo.ch.

The Swiss fear that wealth will...