Have you heard of the Panama papers? A giant leak of 11.5 million legal and financial documents exposing a vast system of secretive offshore companies enabling corruption, tax avoidance, and other forms of wrongdoing? Well that system and how to clean it up is what this episode is about. Regular host Dr Mark Fabian is joined by Dr Matthew Colin, Senior Researcher at the EU tax observatory and one of the most innovative scholars working on elicit finance and how to combat it. The conversation begins with development economics and the tendency for corrupt officials to move their ill gotten gains offshore. It moves from there to London, notorious site of money laundering through real estate investment, to explore recent efforts to combat elicit finance by creating a public ownership registry. Where does the conversation end? With solutions, but you'll have to listen to learn more about them.
Matt's website: https://sites.google.com/view/mattcollin/home
The Panama papers: https://www.icij.org/investigations/panama-papers/
The end of Londongrad? The impact of beneficial ownership transparency on offshore investment in UK property.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/zzoh2ye2aem47cr/uk_bo_main.pdf?dl=0
Jason Sharman's publications (natural experiments of willingness to engage with dodgy clients by banks):
https://www.polis.cam.ac.uk/staff/professor-jason-sharman