Daily Tax Report Quotes Mark Matthews: U.S. Will Get Credit Suisse Account Names Despite Treaty Problems

Caplin & Drysdale's Mark E. Matthews was quoted by the Daily Tax Report on the delay in obtaining the names of Credit Suisse account holders after the bank's May 19th guilty plea for helping U.S. taxpayers hide their money.  The stalled U.S.-Swiss tax treaty is one significant reason Credit Suisse didn't immediately turn over the names, but that doesn't mean the U.S. won't get the names from Credit Suisse and other banks being targeted by U.S. tax authorities.  For the full article, please visit the Daily Tax Report's website (subscription required).

Excerpt taken from the article.

"The Department of Justice has in its gun sights, and will eventually get, all the names of the U.S. account holders," said Mark Matthews, a former chief of criminal investigations with the Internal Revenue Service and now a member of Caplin & Drysdale Chartered. "The victory here is pretty incredible."

Matthews and other practitioners said getting the names would have been much easier had the U.S.-Swiss tax accord not been mired in the U.S. Senate under a hold from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Matthews said the outcome is likely designed to allow Credit Suisse to survive, yet at the same time suffer the reputational harm that comes from admitting to a crime.

"This shows that DOJ is prepared to up the ante and increase the punishment in this area," the Caplin & Drysdale practitioner said. Up until this point, Matthews said, financial institutions may have believed that the worst that could happen was a nonprosecution agreement, similar to that negotiated by Swiss banking giant UBS AG.

"That's now in question," Matthews said.

Other Areas?

He and other practitioners questioned when U.S. prosecutors will aim their efforts at other countries. While the U.S. government has "broken the back of Swiss bank secrecy," he said, "you've sort of pounded the rubble of Switzerland."

"There are other places to hide," Matthews added. "That shoe needs to drop."