Quote from TraderZones:
What??? UBS was caught teaching their wealthy American clients how to intentionally evade taxes and offshore money to beat the legal system. For example "hide diamonds in your toothpaste." They admit to this in the many thousands. Remember a $780 million dollar settlement?
First you are not correct in all of your facts.
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http://www.bobsguide.com/guide/news/2008/Jun/20/UBS_banker_'smuggled_diamonds_in_a_toothpaste_tube'.html
On one occasion, the banker even agreed to buy diamonds for an American client - and to smuggle them out of the country in a toothpaste tube.
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The problem here is that UBS did what others were doing and that is telling people to do things that can be construed as tax evasion. Whether or not that was the case is a decision in a court of law. My point is that you need a court of law.
Whereas the crossing of the American border and not saying that you were to do business is in fact a very clear cut illegal act. The ramifications of it can be quite dramatic.
Quote from TraderZones:
Have you read the huge amounts of money they have had to pony up to cover their terrible business decisions? They were practically the worst of all the IBs.
I live in the country and I am quite aware of what is going on. And I happen to work in the financial field so I know with the drama on what is going on.
UBS was not the worst of the IB's. They were the ones that got caught! Your statement is making the assumption that by getting caught and seeing how extensive things were that they were the worst and nobody else was as bad.
The real problem at hand is that UBS should have put a wall between their American subsidiary and the rest of the world. Had they done that then they could give a nice wave to the American government and told them to bugger off.
Additionally they should not have taken American money and moved it to Switzerland. That was asking for trouble.