KPMG and money laundering

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I've had a quick scan of KPMG's new money laundering report. Here are some fascinating words and phrases not found in it:

1) Tax havens

2) Offshore (except for one mention of sanctions where 'offshore' meant 'outside the USA and with regard to 'offshoring' the anti-money laundering function of a company)

3) Tax (bar a reference to "'black' salaries (without tax being withheld, or the income declared to the tax authorities) and/or corruption payments")

4) Evasion.

Put simply, this suggests to me that KPMG are nowhere near the right wavelength on this issue. But I do note that the report says on each page:

Copyright 2007 KPMG International. KPMG International provides no client services and is a Swiss cooperative with which the independent member firms of the KPMG network are affiliated. All rights reserved.

This says:

a) We work form a tax haven;

b) We do not believe in transparency;

c) We are disingenuous about our corporate structure;

c) We do not align the economic benefit of the transactions we undertake with the form in which they're reported.

Sorry KPMG. Get your act in order, get your thinking straight, act in accordance with generally recognised principles and then start talking. That's the usual rule of credibility.

And whilst we're about it, another rule would be to dissociate your firm from the usual means of money laundering, such as the use of offshore debit cards. In which case can you please explain why I can download this from a KPMG correspondent firm this morning:

If you call that a commitment to tackling money laundering, I don't. And please don't claim ignorance. I drew attention to this in 2002 - and probably forced the change in name of this firm from KPMG. As it transpires that was simply a ruse used to hide the activity from more general awareness, but not to stop it. And, let's face it, based on this they're still KPMG to all intents and purposes. After all, if all the firms are independent, what's the difference between an approved correspondent firm and and any other KPMG? Nothing as far as I can see. But then, KPMG's structure is designed to ensure I can't see.


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