Prosecutors open probes as world's wealthy deny 'Panama Papers' links

The “Panama Papers” revealed financial arrangements of global politicians and public figures

There really is no end to these 'outings.' There is no secure data.

"Governments across the world began investigating possible financial wrongdoing by the rich and powerful on Monday.."

Who is going to investigate the family of Xi Jingping? Oh wait, they already paid off Reuters to leave out his name.

Nothing new here the rich and powerful have been at it since the start of time...

Should be fun to watch the mighty fall over the next few weeks.

I an see a movie being made about this! Who would play Putin I wonder? C'mon Hollywood!

What an incredible leak, we will see some big falls in the coming months

Finally had a chance to look into this a bit more deeply. I was more interested in how this happened. Wired has an informative article outlining what little we know. They call it "Moore’s Law of Leaks," noting that the Pentagon Papers would have contained a couple dozen megabytes, WikiLeaks' 2010 Cablegate was 1.73 gigabytes, and this is 2.6 terabytes. It appears to have been an inside job, with the documents leaked little by little over a period of three years - and the documents represent virtually all the history of Mossack Fonseca's 40-year history.

Historical. We won't lack for interesting news over the next year, that's certain.

http://www.wired.com/2016/04/reporters-pulled-off-panama-papers-biggest-leak-whistleblower-history/

Putin’s spokesman dismissed the reports as “Putinophobia.”

Heh...

I'm sure a topless photo of the Don flashing moobs while wrestling a grizzly bear should be enough to exonerate him from any wrongdoing to your average Russian patriot.

When you control the courts, the media, the armed forces and answer only to yourself I guess you just do what you want when you want ....

Same goes with Xi although I doubt we will be seeing him wrestling a panda anytime soon. LoL

Nobody falls, absolutely nobody , you guys wait and see!

elephant200Apr. 05, 2016 - 05:05PM JST Nobody falls, absolutely nobody , you guys wait and see!

Western democracies will find a few people to hang out and make an example out of. The fact that there are relatively few tends to suggest Western elites are using different means to evade tax, certainly the slimy French elites who seem notably absent.

I'm not expecting the Russian or Chinese dictatorships to even report the scandal, let alone act on it.

Setting offshore accounts by itself isn't illegal. It's when they don't report it for taxes when it becomes illegal.

But even when it's not illegal, the perception would be bad in front of the people.

Politicians are corrupt that the richer they are, the longer they are in power, the more likely they hide their money to cheat their own country. Public servant elected officials should have to release their tax forms; only those who have something to hide would object.

The Western media keeps referring to some "aide" of Putin's as if her were some kind of official advisor, he is nothing of the sort, he's neither a politician nor a government official, he's merely a personal friend of Putin, who happens to be rich, and like every other rich Russian, stashed some money overseas.

Not only that, but the media completely ignores that the guy is a professional cellist - this is Russia, after all. It's not like he plays the ukulele, which totally explains how he acquired hundreds of millions of dollars. Considering the average income in Russia is about $12,000, clearly what they need is more Cellists. Or more personal friends of Putin.

Also annoying is how western media has completely ignored efficiencies of Russian oligarchs. Western democracies require plutocrats to go to elaborate lengths to persuade electorate sectors that structuring an economy in which they can earn multiples in the hundreds compared with those who actually do the work is equitable; they then offshore their cash to avoid paying taxes. How troublesome! Russian oligarchs simply expropriate entire sectors of the economy, then offshore their funds both to pretend that it never happened and to provide a convenient source of liquidity when other oligarchs later want them killed. (Note: the latter purpose is not always effective.)

The inside picture of favoured finance is still visible on the outside, for now.

The comment below prompted a look back to Putin's real estate venture from 2014, and gave some contrast to similar claims about a candidate running for the RNC Triple Crown.

InRe: "The Western media keeps referring to some "aide" of Putin's as if her were some kind of official advisor, he is nothing of the sort, he's neither a politician nor a government official, he's merely a personal friend of Putin, who happens to be rich, and like every other rich Russian, stashed some money overseas." - comments

It isn't an apples and apples, but the backgound of Putin-Trump? 'An Alliance On the Grand Scale!' A Putin-Trump brave new world comrade Trump?(please don't share this information, there have been leaks reported of late)

The Dark Side Of Vladimir Putin's Winter Olympic Games Corruption, environmental damage and, absurdly, no snow. Neil Tweedie reports from Sochi on the vanity project crippling Russia - By Neil Tweedie - 12:00PM GMT 01 Feb 2014

"How much has been spent on the games? No one really knows but the figure being bandied about is £30 billion. To put that in perspective, it is more than three times the cost of London 2012 and equal to the cost of all Winter Olympics put together since 1924. . . . Putin secured the games. Among those benefitting from infrastructure contracts are friends of the 61-year-old president, oligarchs who enjoy their fortunes only at his pleasure. . . . Boris Nemtsov, a deputy prime minister under Boris Yeltsin, and leading critic of the Games, estimates that 15 per cent of the entire budget has gone to companies owned by the Rotenbergs."

source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/winter-olympics/10610000/The-dark-side-of-Vladimir-Putins-Winter-Olympic-Games.html

Just another reminder that these guys run the machine, whereas most of us are just spokes in the wheel.

And remember, spokes can be replaced.

Considering the average income in Russia is about $12,000, clearly what they need is more Cellists. Or more personal friends of Putin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU_QR_FTt3E

Mstislav Rostropovich died in 2007. He was the premier cellist in the world. Very hard to fill the void.

Widely reported in Russia, but then again this stuff is old news, even semi wealthy Russians stash money overseas.

That's sad to hear - not that wealthy people hide money overseas (that happens everywhere) but that people have acquiesced.

The wealthy elites already make the tax laws in the country - and yet they cheat on the very tax laws they make, leaving everyone else to follow the rules and make up their missing shares.

It isn't an apples and apples, but the backgound of Putin-Trump? 'An Alliance On the Grand Scale!' A Putin-Trump brave new world comrade Trump?

They wouldn't be reporting their tax forms as public servant elected officials should.