US Demands UBS Cough Up 50K Tax Cheat Clients

Bank charges IRS is trying to trample on Swiss laws

(NEWSER) - Swiss bank UBS has rejected a demand from the IRS that it cough up the names of 52,000 suspected American tax evaders, the Times of London reports. The bank—which paid out $780 million to avoid prosecution for helping rich Americans dodge their taxes—said the lawsuit by the IRS demanding the information violates Swiss sovereignty and that granting the request would breach the country's secrecy laws. More»

Inquiry into Swiss banks leads hundreds of evaders to come clean

(NEWSER) - A crackdown on tax evasion has led to a flood of wealthy Americans lining up to reveal their offshore accounts to the IRS, reports the Wall Street Journal. A limited-time offer of lower fines, coupled with the ongoing probe of Swiss bank accounts held by UBS, has produced a stampede of tax sinners eager to pay up. "Last week we had 400 applicants, four times as many as in all of last year," says an IRS spokesman. More»

Swiss banking secrecy collapses as investors face tax evasion charges

(NEWSER) - Under pressure from the IRS, Swiss banking giant UBS is closing the offshore accounts of about 19,000 Americans suspected of evading taxes. UBS will transfer the clients' assets to other banks, other divisions of UBS, or the account holders themselves—creating a paper trail that the feds can examine. The move marks a sea change for Swiss banking secrecy, reports the New York Times. More»

(NEWSER) - UBS will hand over the names of 4,450 of its American account holders as part of a tax evasion settlement, the Wall Street Journal reports, and another 5,000 names will be produced under a special IRS amnesty program. UBS won’t pay a monetary fine. Those being turned over may have a chance to fight the disclosure in Swiss court. The compromise gets around potential Swiss objections to the disclosures. More»

(NEWSER) - The IRS and Justice Department crackdown on UBS is widening, reports the Wall Street Journal, as new documents reveal the efforts the bank took to keep its clients' wealth away from the taxman. Two recent cases have relied on channeling millions to a Swiss account owned by a Hong Kong-based enterprise. In one instance, a UBS banker told an American tax dodger that "a lot of United States clients don't report their income." More»