A private Swiss bank will pay $122.9 million in back taxes and penalties after admitting it helped clients hide assets from the tax authorities between 2008 and 2014.
According to court and Justice Department filings, Banque Pictet & Cie, Co helped a group of U.S. taxpayers hide $5.6 billion to hide income, saving them $50.6 million in taxes over the years.
The government’s payment covers taxes owed by the bank’s customers, fees the bank paid on undeclared accounts and a $39 million fine.
” Banque Pictet et Cie admitted that it laboriously helped US taxpayers use enciphered accounts, foreign trusts and realities, designee heirs and other deceptions to hide their income and means overseas,” Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg in a press release from the Ministry of Justice. .
The capitalist was held in 1,637 Swiss bank accounts by Banque Pictet, a wealth and asset operation company that is part of the Pictet Group, a financial services company that said it had $691 billion in assets as of June 30.
The establishment entered into a remitted execution agreement that requires it to cooperate with government examinations. This could include civil or criminal investigations of people whose assets the bank has concealed.
