Graphs at a glance: Switzerland gets away with it for another year as 'top destination' for offshore funds

It's not whether you get caught, it's whether you get away that matters. The great Maradona got away with his "hand of god" goal that knocked England out of the 1986 football World Cup. 

The Swiss got away with their own escape thanks to the "hand of a dolt" who signed the 2011 tax agreement between the UK and Switzerland. An agreement that not only granted anonymity to tax dodgers, but also limited the number of questions the UK tax authorities could ask the Swiss when hunting dodgers. And also failed to extract the "billions in unpaid tax" HMRC expected.


We covered the nonsense of this agreement in an earlier post. The Boston Consulting Group's (BCG) annual "Global Wealth" report for 2014 shows that just as Maradona's misdemeanour didn't do his career any harm, the Swiss too have flourished after their Great Escape from the UK taxman.

When the time came for coughing up all the dodged taxes, the Swiss said the money wasn't there. The Swiss Bankers Association press release stated:

"First indications from selected banks in Switzerland show that there are fewer untaxed UK assets in Switzerland than had been previously assumed." 

What a great advertisement for the Swiss! In 2013 Switzerland held on to its position as top destination for Offshore Wealth. The previous BCG report showed Switzerland holds US$2.2 trillion. Switzerland's 2013 haul of US$2.3 trillion means an extra US$100 billion made it over the Alps.