A Swiss banker has pleaded guilty in the US to concealing more than $60 million from the tax authorities in secret accounts via dubious channels.

A Swiss banker has pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit fraud in the United States. He was involved in a scheme that helped wealthy US taxpayers to conceal their income and assets in offshore accounts.

According to court documents, the former boss of Allied Finance Trust, a Zurich-based financial services company and subsidiary of the Allied Finance Group in Liechtenstein, and his co-conspirators concealed income and assets of wealthy U.S. clients in undeclared bank accounts at Swiss Privatbank IHAG Zurich (IHAG) between 2008 and 2014.

The US Justice Department first brought charges against six Swiss bankers in this case in 2021.

Concealed From Tax Authorities

Together, the group developed and implemented a plan they called the «Singapore Solution» to conceal the bank accounts of the U.S. clients, their assets and their income from the U.S. authorities.

As part of the plan, the group conspired to transfer more than $60 million from the undeclared IHAG accounts of the U.S. taxpayer clients through a series of escrow accounts in Hong Kong and other locations before returning the funds to newly opened accounts with IHAG in the name of a Singapore-based asset management company which a co-conspirator helped to establish.

High Fees Paid

The clients would have paid IHAG and other institutions high fees for them to assist in concealing their assets and helping them evade tax.

In August, the former banker was arrested in Italy and extradited to the United States. He is to be sentenced on 19 July 2024. He faces a custodial sentence of up to five years.