DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... The largest leak of secret documents in history was just released

wonder what else they will find in this leak. those off shore accounts, though.


http://www.businessinsider.com/panama-pa...campaign=buffer

A giant leak of documents from the internal database of a global law firm based in Panama, Mossack Fonseca, has revealed the offshore holdings of 140 politicians, public officials, and athletes around the world.
The leaks — a collaborative effort by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) — were obtained by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, and are comprised of over 11 million records dating back 40 years. They amount to approximately 3 terabytes of data, including corporate records, financial filings, emails, and more. It is roughly 100 times larger than the 1.7 GB of data dumped in 2010 by Wikileaks.

"I think the leak will prove to be probably the biggest blow the offshore world has ever taken because of the extent of the documents," Gerard Ryle, director of the ICIJ, told BBC.

While anonymous company structures hidden in offshore holdings are not illegal, the leaks reveal the extent to which many high-level political figures have relied on shell companies to conceal their wealth, launder money, or evade taxes.

A memorandum from a Mossack Fonseca partner contained in the leak reads, “Ninety-five per cent of our work coincidentally consists in selling vehicles to avoid taxes,” according to The Guardian.

To that end, offshore companies can be also be used for more nefarious purposes, such as to do business with blacklisted firms or individuals.

Among those implicated are Argentinian president Mauricio Macri — who was listed as a director of a Bahamas company that dissolved in 2009 known as Fleg Trading Ltd, which did business in Brazil — and the King of Saudi Arabia, who evidently used shell companies in the British Virgin islands to take out $34 million worth of mortgages for properties in London, Fusion found in a review of the documents.



Here are some of the key findings from the documents being reported by ICIJ, Fusion, and The Guardian, who were among the 100 different media organizations that spent a year reviewing the documents before they were released, according to the ICIJ’s website:

Provide "details on more than 214,000 offshore entities connected to people in more than 200 countries and territories."
"Reveal the offshore holdings 140 politicians and public officials around the world" – including the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan, the president of Ukraine, and the king of Saudi Arabia.

Documents in the leak are linked to the families and associates of Egypt's former president Hosni Mubarak, Libya's former leader Muammar Gaddafi, Syria's president Bashar al-Assad, and the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko.

While Russian President Vladimir Putin was not named in the documents, a number of his closest associates were. The pattern, outlined by The Guardian, is that Putin's friends earn millions from deals that were unlikely to be secured without his help.
The data shows that Sergei Roldugin, Putin's best friend and professional musician, is at the center of a ring of approximately $2 billion in transactions cycled between Bank Rossiya and a series of off-shore companies. As a result, Roldugin is in control of assets about or possibly more than $100 million, including 3.2 %of Bank Rossiya, which has been described as Putin's "crony bank."
Include the names of "at least 33 people and companies blacklisted by the US government" for their alleged links to Mexican drug lords and terror organizations.
Show how "more than 500 banks major banks, including HSBC, UBS and Société Générale," have driven the creation of hard-to-trace companies — roughly 15,000 of them — in offshore havens. The Saudi Crown prince opened an account for his off shore company with UBS, the documents show.
The data reveals how Icelandic Prime Minister Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson had an undeclared interest in Iceland's bailed-out banks. Gunnlaugsson bought off-shore company Wintris in 2007. He failed to declare his interest in the company when entering parliament in 2009.
Business Insider hasn't reviewed all of the documents and is unable to verify their authenticity.

Mossack Fonseca has defended its practices, telling The Guardian in a statement that "it is legal and common for companies to establish commercial entities in different jurisdictions for a variety of legitimate reasons, including conducting cross-border mergers and acquisitions, bankruptcies, estate planning, personal safety, restructuring and pooling of investment capital from different jurisdictions in neutral legal and tax regimes that does not benefit or disadvantage any one investor."

This story will grow...

possibly, once US names start dropping.

however, already looks like FIFA's golden boy is about to get caught up.

FIFA officials, Platini, Messi named in secret offshore files

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/news/fifa-o...29265--sow.html

Paris (AFP) - Disgraced FIFA officials, suspended UEFA chief Michel Platini and Barcelona superstar Lionel Messi were amongst the names found Sunday in leaked documents which reveal offshore financial dealings.

'The Panama Papers' claim the law firm of a FIFA ethics watchdog had business relationships with three men recently indicted in football's global corruption scandal.

Documents also bring to light how some players use offshore companies to bank money from image rights deals.

The findings are the result a year-long investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung and other media outlets.

The records show that a law firm belonging to Juan Pedro Damiani, a member of FIFA's Independent Ethics Committee, did work for offshore companies linked to Eugenio Figueredo, a former FIFA vice president who has been indicted in the US on wire fraud and money laundering charges.

"The records do not show illegal conduct by Damiani or his law firm. But they do raise new questions for Damiani and FIFA," said the report issued by the ICIJ.

A spokesman for the ethics panel told the ICIJ that Damiani had informed the committee in March that he has had business ties to Figueredo.

However, the panel has launched an investigation into Damiani's relationship with Figueredo.

Damiani told the ICIJ, through a spokesperson, that he wasn't authorised to make statements while officials in Uruguay are investigating allegations of corruption related to FIFA.

"He added, however, that he taken a lead in reporting corrupt practices within FIFA to Uruguayan authorities and to the soccer organisation's ethics committee," said the report.

The 11 million leaked records from the files of Mossack Fonseca, a Panama-based law firm, include the names of 20 high-profile footballers.

The most high-profile of all is Argentina and Barcelona star Messi.

Messi and his father Jorge are already due to stand trial in May charged with tax fraud for allegedly failing to declare 4.16 million euros ($4.69 million) in taxes related to his image rights between 2007 and 2009 through front companies in Belize and Uruguay.

The pair are accused of ceding the player's image rights to the companies in order to avoid declaring money made from lucrative deals with sponsors in Spain.

Both men deny any wrongdoing.

The ICIJ said the documents also allege that Platini turned to Mossack Fonseca to help him administer an offshore company created in Panama in 2007.

Platini is serving a six-year ban from all football-related activity for an ethics breach after former FIFA president Sepp Blatter approved a $2 million payment to the Frenchman in 2011 for consultancy work done without a contract a decade earlier.

Late Sunday, Platini's communications service told AFP that his entire financial records and properties had been made known to the Swiss authorities since 2007.

It was made clear that any defamatory comments published could lead to legal action.

The Prime Minister of Iceland resigned today due to the release of these "Panama Papers" as they are now called.

It is beginning to have an effect!

Is that like Zig Zag's?

It has a lot of Rich and Powerful zig zagging!

Better. Guaranteed "sidewinder free".

President just talked about them... there is going to be a big deal over this, I feel it coming.

yep, it's starting to spread like a virus the more and more these documents get looked over.

as 40 reported, already claimed a freaking prime minister. who's next?

This will be bigger than the wiki wiki wild wiki wild wild release!

and it's gonna beg the question of who's worse, the government, or the private sector?

at this point, those two are pretty much indistinguishable. they are practically one in the same, at least here in the US.

looks to me like the same can be said for Russia and Iceland.

let the bodies hit the floor.

You noticed the clear & blatant lack of U.S. names being named among the high profile list, too, eh?
The first things that ran through my head were "how did they keep this secret until they published?" and "who is protecting and enabling them?".

Is it any coincidence that the first person to fall to this is also one of the primary people behind Iceland jailing (so far) 27 bankers who caused the 2008 global financial crisis??

Bam Baby! They got him! Good pickup on your part.

So Bernie was right.

retaliation?

retribution

ooooo

somebody needs to call Keanu Reeves and get this film in production, asap

if anybody who is currently running, or is affiliated with someone who gets popped, Bernie is going on all out attack mode.

Bernie in attack mode is about as scary as Mr Magoo.

As he should. But so should the media, and us.

We will see.

Yep. Any names on that list that are citizens needs to be metaphorically burned at the stake, regardless of political party. Straight up.

Hillary Clinton Ties Emerge In Panama Papers


A billionaire and a Russia-controlled bank named in the Panama Papers have links to Hillary Clinton through two separate lobbying efforts — one through a Clinton-connected lobbying firm and another through Sidney Blumenthal.

Clinton is linked to Sberbank, Russia’s largest bank, through Podesta Group, a lobbying firm co-founded by Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta and his brother, Tony Podesta, a major Clinton bundler.

http://dailycaller.com/2016/04/05/hillary-clinton-ties-emerge-in-panama-papers/

Burn her ass.

Those exposed in the leak include the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan, an alleged bagman for Syrian President Bashar Assad, a close pal of Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and companies linked to the family of Chinese President Xi Jinping. Add to those the monarchs of Saudi Arabia and Morocco, enough Middle Eastern royalty to fill a palace, honchos in the troubled body known as FIFA that controls international soccer and 29 billionaires featured in Forbes Magazine’s list of the world’s 500 richest people.

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/20...r-day-spotlight

They are getting everybody.

But the problem i don't see anybody on any of the networks reporting this crap. MSNBC, Fox News, cnn, all silent.

But they care about cruz's affair?

Man this some BS

Fixed it for ya.

I don't want to get within 10 feet of her ass.

My disdain for Hillary is well documented but this is where it's going to get tough. Somebody's name isn't on the list (though hers might still be, we don't know) but people with who they have dealings is on the list. To what extent can you hold them responsible for that person being on the list? There are going to be the obvious, then there are going to be a ton of "guilt by association" folks.. it's going to get very messy.

This is all just breaking. Patients Lad.

Agreed. I'm not a Hillary fan, but who hasn't she had financial dealings with?

She takes money from pretty much everyone

...and there goes her chances at the general.

Panama Papers read like Who's Who of world power...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2016/04/04/panama-papers-list/82607516/

Here are some of the Americans listed...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-05/here-are-some-americans-panama-papers

Luckily for me I changed my name from 39 to 40. PHEW

and people aren't in favor of auditing the Fed. pffft

people are starting to drop like flies. boy oh boy

A disclosure of corruption is always needed from time to time. Time to clean house.

So, does the end of this show these people created a financial crisis to hedge against it? That's how soros has gotten rich.

I just hope they never find those old coffee cans I buried. I don't want them to find the $2819.13 I been hiding from them there IRS fellers for all these years.

40!! look who got caught up. lmao ah man this is great.

British Prime Minister David Cameron acknowledges profiting from offshore trust

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/put...38bb_story.html

LONDON — After dodging questions for days, British Prime Minister David Cameron acknowledged Thursday evening that he had owned and profited from shares in an offshore trust set up by his late father.

The admission came as the impact from a huge leak of financial data continued to ripple across the globe, with Russian President Vladimir Putin alleging a Western conspiracy and Iceland reckoning with the fall of its prime minister.

Cameron himself faced calls to resign from at least one member of the opposition Labour Party on Thursday night. But so far at least, there’s been no evidence that Cameron did anything illegal or improper.

Still, the admission of a past financial stake in an offshore trust represented an awkward moment for a leader who has spoken out forcefully against international tax avoidance and evasion.

[The mysterious call that launched the Panama Papers probes]

What are the Panama Papers?
Play Video2:24
The Panama Papers consist of 11.5 million documents from Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca. The papers apparently implicate a number of high-profile global figures in potentially illegal financial activities. (The Washington Post)
After the fund was linked to Cameron’s stockbroker father this week, Downing Street issued a series of statements — first claiming that the issue was “a private matter,” then saying that Cameron did not currently own shares in the trust and finally that the prime minister and his family would not benefit from it in the future. But until Thursday night, Cameron had been vague about the past.

He told Britain’s ITV News that he had sold his interest in the trust in 2010, months before he became prime minister, for about 30,000 British pounds, or nearly $50,000. The Panama-based trust did not have to pay British taxes on its profits, though Cameron said that he had paid income tax on his dividends and that both he and his father had followed the law.

“I don’t have anything to hide,” he said. “I’m proud of my dad and what he did and the business he established.”

The acknowledgment was part of the ongoing fallout from this week’s publication of the Panama Papers, a leak of millions of documents from a Panamanian law firm that for decades has helped some of the world’s most prominent leaders set up offshore accounts, shell companies and other transactions.

The Panama Papers documents carry references to people around the world, including prominent Chinese officials. On Tuesday, Iceland’s premier, Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson, resigned amid an uproar about an offshore account held by his wife.

Putin on Thursday condemned the leak of confidential offshore account details, claiming it was part of a Western plot to weaken Russia. The comments were his first public reaction to the Panama Papers. An international consortium of journalists examining the papers found that Putin’s childhood friend, renowned cellist Sergei Roldugin, was linked to a web of transactions totaling about $2 billion.

[NSA leaker Snowden mocks British leader’s call for privacy]

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a media forum in St. Petersburg on April 7. (Dmitri Lovetsky/AP)
Roldugin has denied any wrongdoing. Putin was not personally named in the papers, a fact he used to suggest that the disclosures were meant to harm him by association.

“Yours truly is not there,” Putin said, referring to himself. “So what did they do then? They produced an information product. They found some acquaintances and friends. They dug up some stuff and glued it together.”


Putin said that Roldugin — who introduced Putin to his wife — was simply involved in a bit of business.

“Many creative professionals in Russia — probably half of them — are trying to do business and, to my knowledge, Sergei Pavlovich has been trying, too,” Putin said, referring to Roldugin by his first two names.

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“What is his business? He is a minority shareholder in one of our companies, and he is making some money but definitely not billions of dollars. Nonsense, there is nothing of the sort,” Putin said.

The reports are aimed at dividing Russia from within, Putin claimed, “by infusing some mistrust in society toward government bodies and the government, and by setting people against each other.”

In many cases, the offshore accounts were politically embarrassing but not illegal, highlighting a loophole in the international financial system that has helped generations of the world’s wealthiest people sidestep taxes and guard their money.

The public reaction in Russia to the Panama Papers has been muted, in part because pro-Kremlin outlets have paid little attention to the Russians named in the files. Far more publicity has been given to the offshore accounts of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, who has also denied any wrongdoing.

As the article says, politically embarrassing, but not illegal or improper. Which, again, is why I do wonder why the Icelandic PM resigned, but his story may be different.

The other thing I'm currently wondering is "what is this currently distracting us from?".

it's not distracting us from anything, as the major networks still aren't pick up on this stuff like they should be.

which means people in the US are trying to keep this in the shadows as long as possible.