The Clintons and the sordid UBS affair

[think]

The Clintons and the sordid UBS affair

By Ernest A. Canning - March 10, 2016, 06:00 am

The story, as originally recounted by James V. Grimaldi and Rebecca Ballhaus of The Wall Street Journal, was, of itself, deeply troubling. In March 2009, after meeting with Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton intervened with the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on behalf of Switzerland's most powerful banking institution, UBS. The IRS, which at that time was seeking the identity of wealthy Americans who had stashed some $20 billion in 52,000 tax evading UBS accounts, then agreed that the Swiss bank need only turn over information on 4,450 accounts. Afterwards, UBS increased its previous $60,000 in donations to the Clinton Foundation ten-fold. By the end of 2014, UBS donations to the Clinton Foundation totaled $600,000. UBS also "paid former President Bill Clinton $1.5 million to participate in a series of question-and-answer sessions with UBS Wealth Management Chief Executive Bob McCann, making UBS his biggest single corporate source of speech income disclosed since he left the White House."

Those facts, of themselves, raise disturbing questions. Did a bank that still ranks as "the world's biggest wealth manager" and has at its disposal a bevy of economists and law firms have a legitimate reason for paying Bill Clinton $1.5 million in speaking fees? Or was the $1.5 million and the tenfold increase in Clinton Foundation donations a reward for the former secretary of State's intervention? If the latter, that reward would have, under federal law (18 U.S.C. § 201(c)(1)(A)), amounted to an illicit bribe.

But there's a more troubling question that arises. There can be little doubt that a media firestorm would ensue if a former president were to accept a lucrative speaking fee from the Mafia. Should the reaction be any different when the speaking fee comes from "banksters" who defrauded the U.S. government?

That's the true context here, according to a Feb. 18, 2009 U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) press release that discussed the details of an unsealed "criminal information" and a "deferred prosecution agreement." The DoJ alleges that UBS did much more than permit wealthy Americans to stash billions in tax evading offshore accounts. In direct violation of a 2000 agreement with the IRS, Swiss bankers traveled to the U.S. 3,800 times to foster the elicit business and "used encrypted laptops and other counter-surveillance techniques to help prevent the detection of their marketing efforts and the identities and offshore assets of their U.S. clients."...

Read more:
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/presidential-campaign/272396-the-clintons-and-the-sordid-ubs-affair

[CorporatistNation]

1. AND People Actually Are Voting For Hillary?

What IS Wrong With People? WTF?

[think]

2. Crazy isn't it.... /nt

[cosmicone]

3. Meh... that dead horse has been beaten enough n/t

[think]

4. You think it's a joke that Hillary intervened & stopped the IRS from getting access to tax cheats?

And right after doing so they pay Bill $1.5 million for a Q&A session and donate $600k to the Clinton Foundation?

When UBS, which could have lost its ability to conduct business in the U.S. if successfully prosecuted, balked at the IRS demand that it turn over information for all 52,000 accounts, the IRS filed a legal action seeking to compel disclosure. That is when, at the behest of the Swiss government, Hillary Clinton stepped in to negotiate a deal that prevented the IRS from gaining access to more than 91 percent of the illicit, tax-evading offshore accounts.

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/presidential-campaign/272396-the-clintons-and-the-sordid-ubs-affair

[cosmicone]

5. Non-story with doubtful sources by RW or extreme LW

Very HA Goodmanesque

[think]

6. You are joking right? Are you claiming Hillary didn't intervene on behalf of UBS & UBS didn't pay

Bill $1.5 million for a series of Q&A sessions?

[amborin]

7. it's blatant corruption

Triana (21,877 posts)

Hillary helped UBS, then it gave Bill 1.5 million. . . .
After Hillary negotiated a soft tax evasion settlement with UBS, they paid Bill $1.5 million . . .

The Swiss bank UBS is one of the biggest, most powerful financial institutions in the world. As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton intervened to help it out with the IRS. And after that, the Swiss bank paid Bill Clinton $1.5 million for speaking gigs. The Wall Street Journal reported all that and more Thursday in an article that highlights huge conflicts of interest that the Clintons have created in the recent past.

. . .

“A few weeks after Hillary Clinton was sworn in as secretary of state in early 2009, she was summoned to Geneva by her Swiss counterpart to discuss an urgent matter. The Internal Revenue Service was suing UBS AG to get the identities of Americans with secret accounts,” the newspaper reports. “If the case proceeded, Switzerland’s largest bank would face an impossible choice: Violate Swiss secrecy laws by handing over the names, or refuse and face criminal charges in U.S. federal court. Within months, Mrs. Clinton announced a tentative legal settlement—an unusual intervention by the top U.S. diplomat. UBS ultimately turned over information on 4,450 accounts, a fraction of the 52,000 sought by the IRS.”

Then reporters James V. Grimaldi and Rebecca Ballhaus lay out how UBS helped the Clintons. “Total donations by UBS to the Clinton Foundation grew from less than $60,000 through 2008 to a cumulative total of about $600,000 by the end of 2014, according to the foundation and the bank,” they report. “The bank also joined the Clinton Foundation to launch entrepreneurship and inner-city loan programs, through which it lent $32 million. And it paid former president Bill Clinton $1.5 million to participate in a series of question-and-answer sessions with UBS Wealth Management Chief Executive Bob McCann, making UBS his biggest single corporate source of speech income disclosed since he left the White House.”

The article adds that “there is no evidence of any link between Mrs. Clinton’s involvement in the case and the bank’s donations to the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation, or its hiring of Mr. Clinton.” Maybe it’s all a mere coincidence, and when UBS agreed to pay Bill Clinton $1.5 million the relevant decision-maker wasn’t even aware of the vast sum his wife may have saved the bank or the power that she will potentially wield after the 2016 presidential election.

But even that wouldn’t make accepting the $1.5 million excusable.

THE REST:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07/hillary-helps-a-bankand-then-it-pays-bill-15-million-in-speaking-fees/400067/
7

more here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511200048

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251819332

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511092781

[think]

8. Thank you for providing this additional information and links. /nt

[Octafish]

9. Goes to the heart of the problem -- concentration of money and power in secret hands.

UBS was gonna name 52,000 American tax cheats until State Department intervened and made them stop at 4,450.

You know who's in "Wealth Management" at UBS? Phil Gramm and Bill Clinton - two people from opposing parties and the most responsible for repealing Glass Steagal, back in the day.

http://financialservicesinc.ubs.com/revitalizingamerica/SenatorPhilGramm.html

It is so rewarding to see them working together again, keeping alive the fruits of Buy Partisanship.

[think]

10. Keep forgetting about Phil Graham and his earlier role along with Bill in

making sure Glass Seagull was done away with.

Now both in wealth management together at UBS. Telling.

Also kind of wonder who was on that list of 52,000 that avoided the IRS probe.

Always appreciate your posts and input. Thank you.