Bradley C. Birkenfeld - Lucifer’s Banker Uncensored

Bradley Birkenfelda name you will never forget.

NEW HAVEN REGISTER

The most significant financial whistleblower of all time.

CNBC

Simply put, Birkenfeld must be considered among the biggest whistleblowers of all time.

TAX NOTES

If a single person can be credited with drawing popular attention to the offshore world, it may be Bradley Birkenfeld.

FINANCIAL TIMES

In 2007, the veil of secrecy was shattered by a whistleblower named Bradley Birkenfeld.

THE WASHINGTON POST

UBS whistleblower Bradley Birkenfeld deserves a statue on Wall Street, not a prison sentence.

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

I will say that without Mr. Birkenfeld walking in the door of the Department of Justice in the summer of 2007, I doubt as of today this massive fraud scheme would have ever been discovered by the United States government.

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE PROSECUTOR

The comprehensive information provided by the whistleblower was exceptional in both its breadth and depth and formed the basis for unprecedented actions against UBS AG.

INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE WHISTLEBLOWER OFFICE

So does Mr. Birkenfeld deserve the award of $104 million? Every penny!

INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE AGENT

Renewed Copyright 2020 Restless Media GmbH

Original Copyright 2016 Bradley C. Birkenfeld

SECOND EDITION

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

All information included in this book is based on the Authors recollections, opinions, and views. Publisher makes no representations, warranties, guarantees or otherwise with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book.

ISBN 9781645720225 (Hardcover)

9781645720232 (ebook)

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Republic Book Publishers

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Book designed by Mark Karis

Author photo by Pontus Hook

Printed in the United States of America

For my brother Doug, who has been with me from the first day I started on this roller-coaster ride. A loyal friend and brilliant lawyer, he witnessed the corruption, understood what was going on, and advised me along the way.

An event has happened, upon which it is difficult to speak, and impossible to be silent.

EDMUND BURKE, EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY IRISH PHILOSOPHER

WHEN WE THINK OF THE COLOR OF MONEY, most people first imagine the faded green of a US dollar or the blue and reddish tints on a Euro note. Passed from hand to hand, the light-colored bills ruffle gently, with shiny flecks of thread testifying to their authenticity.

In business, money is black letters on the white background of a spreadsheet or a receipt. But in the world of political corruption and banking secrecy, that background itself goes dark, the better to obscure the digits that show evidence of tax evasion, money laundering or influence-peddling.

Lucifers Banker Uncensored descends into these dark places and exposes how wealthy people can hide their assets from the governmentand use those assets to help corrupt the very same governments. It is a practice that still goes on in many places around the world, but one that needs to be brought out of the deep darkness of secret records, numbered accounts, and offshore companies. Bradley Birkenfelds courageous story shows how hard that really is.

My experience parallels with Brads revelations in many ways, but we work different sides of the street. He knows the financial ledgers, the account holders, and the faces behind those secure safe deposit boxes. In my work as an investigative journalist, I cannot ordinarily see those things. Instead, my team and I look at how those funds wind up influencing governments and buying politicians. A great example here is the connection between UBS and the Bill and Hillary Clinton Foundation, Inc. I wrote a book in 2015 called Clinton Cash: How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich that revealed the activities of the Clintons family charity, especially while Hillary was serving as President Obamas first Secretary of State. Our research found many coincidences and overlaps between actions by the Obama administration and the pattern of countless donations to the Clinton Foundation.

But what my team did not discover was the vast tax evading schemes that existed in certain overseas banking institutions that enabled wealthy Americans to hide their moneysometimes in very large quantitiesfrom U.S. tax authorities. Although what these tax-cheaters were doing was illegal in the United States, it was not only legal, but encouraged, in those foreign countries. Secret numbered accounts, laws that prohibited the disclosure of such accounts and assured absolute secrecy for the depositors, and elaborate investment schemes which enabled depositors to earn large profits, all invisible to the American tax authorities and prosecutors were invisible to investigative reporters like me. Invisible, that is, until Bradley Birkenfeld came along with his tell-all story.

No matter how many laws and regulations are enacted in any country, wealthy people will inevitably try to find ways to mask their wealth, its sources, and where it gets hidden. They can and do pay lots of money to financial experts to help them orchestrate this; smart, wealthy people will always find a way to cheat the system.

That is why Lucifers Banker Uncensored is so important. Investigative journalists like me and the research team at the Government Accountability Institute must spend months, even years, sifting through records that often mask more than they reveal. But an insider who really knows the stories, motivations, names and faces behind all those digits will always know more than we can glean. So, when banking insider Bradley Birkenfeld became disgusted with the nefarious dealings he saw firsthand at UBS and decided to become a whistle-blower, we must pay attention.

Our reporting on Bill and Hillary Clintons activities dovetails nicely with what you will learn here. We reported on how the former president received his largest paydays since leaving the White House while his wife was serving as Secretary of State. This included $1.8 million from TD Bank in Canada for giving 10 speeches over roughly a two-year period, right around the time the bank was the largest shareholder in the Keystone XL pipeline project. Brad will tell you about how UBS Wealth Management paid the former president $1.5 million for a series of fireside chats Bill Clinton agreed to do for their high net worth clients. Not only that, UBS also donated more than $600,000 to the Clinton Foundation.