マイ.オペラ.コム/ux50 　 　 ☆☆☆☆

Bloombergに『Birkenfeld Says UBS Helped Clients Hide $20 Billion 』とあり、

The private banking unit of UBS AG, the Swiss bank, engaged in a variety of schemes to help wealthy U.S. clients conceal $20 billion in assets and evade income tax laws, an ex-banker said in pleading guilty to conspiracy.
Bradley Birkenfeld, 43, and his colleagues helped wealthy Americans hide money by telling them to put cash and jewelry in Swiss safety deposit boxes, buy artwork and jewels using offshore accounts, and set up accounts in the names of others, he said yesterday in federal court in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
Birkenfeld is helping a Justice Department probe of Zurich- based UBS, and said the practices he described are common among his former colleagues. Birkenfeld said UBS helped wealthy Americans evade taxes even after signing a 2001 agreement that required it to identify account holders and their income to U.S. tax authorities. He said many clients refused to disclose their assets because it would defeat the purpose of banking with UBS -- evading taxes.
``Rather than risk losing the approximately $20 billion of assets under management in the United States undeclared business,'' UBS ``assisted these wealthy U.S. clients in concealing their ownership of the assets held offshore,'' Birkenfeld said in a written statement accompanying his plea.
UBS earned about $200 million a year in revenue by helping high-income clients through such practices as setting up sham entities in tax havens including Switzerland, Panama, British Virgin Islands, Hong Kong and Liechtenstein, Birkenfeld said.

今時、ちょっと信じがたい昔からのスイス流の技のように見受けます。凄まじいですね。 それもスイス最大の銀行がやっているのですから、無数にある小規模の銀行ではどうなのかなぁと想像すると... このような違法行為を犯す銀行も悪ですが、違法と知りながら巨額のお金をこっそりと隠す大金持ちの方々も罰せられるべきではないでしょうか。どうせなら、該当する顧客の名簿を公に公開し、罰するのが見せしめと思いますが... きっと映画俳優やプロスポーツ選手、政府高官とか著名な方々が多いであろうと想像します。どちらにしてもこのようなケースは氷山の一角でしょう。お金が人や組織を狂わせる模範例かと... 恥を忘れた方々が極端に増えたここ30年間かなぁと...