The End of Bank Secrecy in Offshore Financial Centers: Ethical Issues and International Tax Competition

This paper is a survey of the literature that studies the end of bank secrecy in offshore financial centers. Research in this area can be read under two perspectives. On the one hand, the existence of the bank secrecy raises ethical issues like the respect of confidentiality, the equality of all before the taxation, tax evasion and the support for corrupted regimes. On the other hand, bank secrecy and its removal affect international tax competition among nation states and thus the incentives of exchange of information. A critical analysis of the existing contributions along these two strands enables us to understand better indirect and complex effects of the recent reforms on international competition for capital.