Gunster shareholder Martin Press, a tax expert in the firm’s Fort Lauderdale office, was quoted recently in a couple of articles about the U.S. offshore tax-evasion probe.
According to the articles, roughly one-third of Swiss banks claimed an intent to participate in the U.S. amnesty program announced last August, which offers non-prosecution agreements to Swiss financial institutions in exchange for the payment of fines, and information on undeclared accounts and how the institutions helped Americans evade taxes.
Press told USA Today that taxpayers who did not previously take advantage of leniency offers by the IRS will now essentially be forced to come forward, and they will no longer qualify for leniency once federal investigators can identify them.
More Swiss banks participated in the deal than expected, a New York attorney told the Bloomgberg writer. In that article, Press indicated U.S. authorities have been successful in their efforts to get Swiss banks to cooperate in the tax-evasion probe.
The amnesy deal, announced last August, is part of a five-year crackdown by the U.S. Justice Department on offshare tax evasion.
Read the stories:
- Swiss banks closer to deals in tax-evasion probe (USA Today, January 25, 2014)
- Swiss banks seek tax amnesty as third accept U.S. offer (Bloomberg, January 26, 2014)
