HSBC admits Gaps by the Directorate General of Geneva, speaks of "failures of compliance '
LONDON: British bank HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA.L) admitted on Sunday defects by its Swiss subsidiary, in response to media reports, it helped wealthy clients evade taxes and hide millions of dollars of assets.
"We recognize and are responsible for compliance and control failures past," said HSBC Sunday after newspapers, including French newspaper Le Monde and The Guardian UK published allegations about his private Swiss bank.
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The Guardian, with other media outlets cited documents obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) by Le Monde.HSBC said that its Swiss subsidiary had not been fully integrated into HSBC after its acquisition in 1999, allowing standards "significantly lower" compliance and due diligence to persist.
The Guardian claimed in its report that the files showed HSBC Swiss bank regularly allowed customers to remove "bricks" of money, often in foreign currencies that were of little use in Switzerland, commercialized systems that were likely to allow rich clients to avoid taxes and European connivance with some hiding undeclared accounts with the national tax authorities.
HSBC said that the sector of the Swiss private bank, long known for its secrecy, operated differently in the past and this may have led HSBC have had "a number of customers who were not fully compliant with their tax obligations apply. "Its private bank, especially its Swiss subsidiary, had undergone a "radical transformation" in recent years, he said in a detailed four-page statement.
Swiss private bank HSBC was largely gained through its acquisition of Republic National Bank of New York and Safra Republic Holdings, a US private bank.
HSBC said the number of accounts of its Swiss private bank had fallen from 30,412 in 2007 to 10,343 at the end of last year and has been cooperating with authorities investigating tax matters.
The data were provided by Herve Falciani, a former employee of the IT Swiss private bank HSBC. HSBC Falciani downloaded details of accounts and customers in late 2006 and early 2007. The French authorities have obtained data on thousands of customers and share with the tax authorities elsewhere, including Argentina.
Switzerland instructed Falciani, which Reuters could not reach for comment, industrial espionage and violating the secrecy laws of the country. Falciani has told Reuters that he is a whistleblower trying to help governments track down people who used Swiss bank accounts to evade taxes.
Some of the details of the list were released before. The names of 2,000 Greeks with HSBC accounts was released in 2010 and dubbed the "Lagarde List" after former French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde. France adopted the names to Greece to help curb tax evasion.
LONDON: British bank HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA.L) admitted on Sunday defects by its Swiss subsidiary, in response to media reports, it helped wealthy clients evade taxes and hide millions of dollars of assets.
"We recognize and are responsible for compliance and control failures past," said HSBC Sunday after newspapers, including French newspaper Le Monde and The Guardian UK published allegations about his private Swiss bank.
RELATED
Black Money Abroad: 350 estimated accounts, 60 cases filed
How special investigation team supports the new names on the HSBC list
How whistleblower main Hervé Falciani help India to black money investigation
The Guardian, with other media outlets cited documents obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) by Le Monde.HSBC said that its Swiss subsidiary had not been fully integrated into HSBC after its acquisition in 1999, allowing standards "significantly lower" compliance and due diligence to persist.
The Guardian claimed in its report that the files showed HSBC Swiss bank regularly allowed customers to remove "bricks" of money, often in foreign currencies that were of little use in Switzerland, commercialized systems that were likely to allow rich clients to avoid taxes and European connivance with some hiding undeclared accounts with the national tax authorities.
HSBC said that the sector of the Swiss private bank, long known for its secrecy, operated differently in the past and this may have led HSBC have had "a number of customers who were not fully compliant with their tax obligations apply. "Its private bank, especially its Swiss subsidiary, had undergone a "radical transformation" in recent years, he said in a detailed four-page statement.
Swiss private bank HSBC was largely gained through its acquisition of Republic National Bank of New York and Safra Republic Holdings, a US private bank.
HSBC said the number of accounts of its Swiss private bank had fallen from 30,412 in 2007 to 10,343 at the end of last year and has been cooperating with authorities investigating tax matters.
The data were provided by Herve Falciani, a former employee of the IT Swiss private bank HSBC. HSBC Falciani downloaded details of accounts and customers in late 2006 and early 2007. The French authorities have obtained data on thousands of customers and share with the tax authorities elsewhere, including Argentina.
Switzerland instructed Falciani, which Reuters could not reach for comment, industrial espionage and violating the secrecy laws of the country. Falciani has told Reuters that he is a whistleblower trying to help governments track down people who used Swiss bank accounts to evade taxes.
Some of the details of the list were released before. The names of 2,000 Greeks with HSBC accounts was released in 2010 and dubbed the "Lagarde List" after former French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde. France adopted the names to Greece to help curb tax evasion.
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