We are on the right side of history at the right time.

So said Raymond Baker in his opening conference comments this morning. And I agree with him.

The Task Force on Financial Integrity and Economic Development is a unique global coalition of civil society organizations and more than 50 governments working together to address inequalities in the financial system that penalize billions of people. Launched by Global Financial Integrity in January 2009, the Task Force advocates for greatly improved transparency and accountability in the global financial system.

The Task Force advocates five priorities:

• curtailment of mispricing in trade imports and exports;
• country-by-country accounting of sales, profits, and taxes paid by multinational corporations;
• confirmation of beneficial ownership in all banking and securities accounts;
• automatic cross-border exchange of tax information; and
• harmonization of predicate offenses under anti-money laundering laws — each one focusing on transparency.

This is the right time in history for each of these.

That’s what this conference is about.

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