汇丰税务丑闻有损银行保密理念

Soon after Stuart Gulliverbecame chief executive of HSBC at the start of 2011 he hung a “for sale” sign on the Swiss private bank it had owned since completing the acquisition of a rival more than a decade earlier.

欧智华(Stuart Gulliver)2011年初出任汇丰(HSBC)行政总裁后不久，便着手挂牌出售汇丰瑞士私人银行。这家私人银行是十多年前汇丰从竞争对手那里收购来的。

Mr Gulliver abandoned the sale process after a lukewarm response from potential buyers. Yet given the furore this week over revelations of what had been going on at HSBC’s Swiss private bank at the time, it is easy to understand why he was eager to exit the business.

在看到潜在买家的反应比较冷淡后，欧智华放弃了出售。不过，考虑到汇丰瑞士私人银行当时的作为本周被泄露后引发的轰动，人们很容易理解他当时为何急着退出这块业务了。

Leaked bank account documents for clients of HSBC’s Swiss private bank between 2005 and 2007 have found their way to the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and other news groups.

遭泄露的2005年至2007年间汇丰瑞士私人银行客户银行账户文件，几经周折到了华盛顿国际调查记者联盟(International

Consortium of Investigative Journalists)和其他新闻组织手中。

There are 60,000 leaked files, some of which provide details of how the bank was aware of tax-avoidance and wrongdoing by some clients. The total value held in the bank accounts exceeds $100bn for 100,000 wealthy clients. Yesterday news media published revelations about widespread tax-avoidance practices in HSBC’s Swiss operation at the time, prompting an outcry from some quarters about why governments — who have had these documents for almost five years — have not done more to prosecute people where appropriate.

遭泄露的文件有6万份，其中一些文件详细记述了这家私人银行如何知悉某些客户的避税和不当行为。该行为10万名富有客户持有的资产总价值超过1000亿美元。昨天，新闻媒体报道了相关爆料，揭露出当时在汇丰瑞士私人银行普遍存在的避税操作，这导致某些方面的人士对政府发出强烈抗议，他们质疑已掌握这些文件将近5年的政府为何不在条件适宜时采取更多措施起诉嫌疑人。

“This is extremely damaging both for the bank and for the concept of banking secrecy,” says a rival Swiss banker, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“无论是对银行，还是对银行保密理念，这都是极为有害的，”来自对手公司的一名瑞士银行家匿名表示。

“HSBC’s franchise was already pretty damaged here, which is why they tried to sell it a few years ago.”

“汇丰这块特许经营业务当时已经千疮百孔，这就是为什么几年前他们试图卖掉它。”

The reports allege that HSBC’s Swiss private bank provided large, untraceable bricks of cash in foreign currencies to clients and colluded with them to conceal “black” accounts from tax authorities. Code names including Captain Kirk, Painter and Capitaine Haddock were used to disguise clients’ identities. It also “aggressively marketed” schemes likely to enable wealthy European clients to avoid taxes. France, Belgium and Argentina have launched formal probes into allegations that HSBC helped citizens of those countries to hide undeclared money in accounts at its Swiss private bank.

这些报道声称，汇丰瑞士私人银行向客户提供难以追踪的成捆外币现金，并与他们串通向税务部门隐瞒“黑”账户。“柯克船长”(Captain Kirk)、“油漆工”(Painter)和“阿道克船长”(Capitaine Haddock)等代号被用于掩饰客户的真实身份。它还“积极推销”一些很可能让富有的欧洲客户能够避税的方案。法国、比利时和阿根廷已针对有关汇丰帮助本国公民在汇丰瑞士私人银行隐匿未申报财产的说法启动了正式调查。

In the UK, investigations by the authorities have resulted in about £135m of unpaid tax, interest and penalties being handed over by the British citizens involved, only one of whom — Michael Shanly, a property developer — has been prosecuted for tax evasion.

在英国，有关部门展开的调查已导致涉案英国公民缴纳了约1.35亿英镑欠缴税款、利息和罚款，这些涉案公民中只有一人——地产开发商迈克尔•尚利(Michael Shanly)——已受到起诉，罪名是逃税。

HSBC said many private banks at the time, including its own Swiss operation, had “a number of clients that may not have been fully compliant with their applicable tax obligations. We acknowledge and are accountable for past compliance and control failures.”

汇丰称，包括其自身的瑞士业务在内，当时很多私人银行都有“大量客户可能没有充分遵守自己适用的纳税义务。我行承认过去在合规和管控上存在失误，并对此负责。”

The bank said: “We have taken significant steps over the past several years to implement reforms and exit clients who do not meet strict new HSBC standards.” It added that its private bank client base had shrunk 70 per cent in a decade.

该行表示：“我行已在过去几年里采取重大步骤实施改革，与达不到汇丰严格新标准的客户终止业务关系。”它补充称，过去十年其私人银行客户群已缩水了70%。

It also said that the acquisition of Republic National Bank of New York and Safra Republic Holdings in 1999 — accounting for the bulk of its Swiss private bank — brought with it “a very different client base and had a significantly different culture to HSBC”.

汇丰还表示，1999年对纽约利宝银行(Republic National Bank of New York)和Safra Republic Holdings的收购（汇丰瑞士私人银行主要脱胎于此次收购），为它带来了“一个截然不同的客户群，（这块业务）有着与汇丰截然不同的文化。”

“The business acquired was not fully integrated into HSBC, allowing different cultures and standards to persist,” the bank said. “With hindsight, it’s clear that too many small and high-risk accounts were maintained and the business was stretched over more than 150 geographical markets.”

“购得的这块业务没有充分融入汇丰，这使得不同的文化和标准得以继续存在。”汇丰称，“事后看来，显然保有了太多的高风险小账户，而且这块业务铺得太广，覆盖了逾150个地区市场。”

HSBC is one of several Swiss banks still being investigated by the US Department of Justice for allegedly helping American citizens to evade the taxman. UBS and Credit Suisse have settled with the DoJ, paying fines of $780m and $2.6bn respectively.

汇丰是仍在接受美国司法部(US Department of Justice)调查的几家瑞士银行之一，这些银行涉嫌帮助美国公民逃税。瑞银(UBS)和瑞信(Credit Suisse)已与美国司法部达成和解，分别支付了7.8亿和26亿美元罚款。

Switzerland has signed agreements with several European countries to allow clients of Swiss banks to declare money that had been hidden from tax authorities in return for paying the tax they owe, interest and potential fines.

瑞士已与一些欧洲国家签署协议，以使瑞士银行的客户能够申报以前向税务部门隐瞒的资金，交换条件是要支付他们欠缴的税款、利息及可能的罚金。

Mr Gulliver has stressed the importance of keeping HSBC out of trouble since he took over. The bank paid almost $2bn in fines and signed a five-year deferred prosecution agreement with US authorities in December 2012 after admitting that it processed drug-trafficking proceeds through Mexico and transmitted funds from sanctioned countries including Iran.

欧智华上任以来已强调过让汇丰远离麻烦的重要性。2012年12月，在承认经办了墨西哥毒枭的贩毒所得和帮助客户从伊朗等受制裁国家转移出资金后，该行支付了近20亿美元罚款并与美国监管部门达成了延期起诉协议。

The agreement puts it at risk of a criminal conviction and potential loss of its crucial US banking licence if it commits another crime in that period. The tax-dodging allegations relate to actions that happened before the deal.

根据这项协议，如果汇丰在那段时间内再有不法行为，它可能会面临刑事定罪，并有可能失去其关键的美国银行业牌照。本文上面提到的涉嫌逃避税收的操作，发生在该协议签署之前。

There are signs that HSBC has been dismantling its private bank, which produced 3 per cent of the group’s $12.3bn of total pre-tax profits in the first half of 2014. Krishna Patel, HSBC’s global head of private banking, resigned in December 2012. Alexandre Zeller, head of global private banking for Europe, Middle East and Africa, left in February of that year. HSBC has pulled out of its stately Geneva lakefront offices in a sign of the depth of change at its Swiss operations.

有迹象显示，汇丰已在剥离其私人银行业务——2014年上半年，后者创造的利润占该集团总计123亿美元税前利润的3%。汇丰私人银行业务全球主管克里希纳•帕特尔(Krishna Patel)于2012年12月辞职，欧洲、中东和非洲地区全球私人银行业务主管亚历山大•泽勒(Alexandre Zeller)于那一年的2月离职。汇丰已撤出了其位于日内瓦湖畔的富丽堂皇的办公室，标志着其瑞士业务经历了多么深层的调整。

Last year, it sold $12.5bn of Swiss private banking assets to Liechtenstein’s LGT Group, cutting its total assets by 15 per cent. In recent months, rival bankers have started to speculate that Mr Gulliver will once again look for a full exit.

去年，汇丰将125亿美元的瑞士私人银行资产出售给了列支敦士登的LGT Group，相当于这块业务之前资产的15%。近几个月，对手公司的银行家开始猜测，欧智华将再次寻求全盘退出这块业务。