Countries sign up to OECD agreement on tax information

Tuesday 17th March 2009, 2:59PM GMT.

THE Singapore and Hong Kong governments are among a clutch of jurisdictions that have agreed in principle to sign up to the OECD standard for exchange of information.

According to a press release from the Singapore Ministry of Finance last week, legal amendments are to be introduced later this year.

Statements were also issued at the end of last week by several European countries – and key competitors to Jersey – including Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Austria indicating that they would be prepared to relax banking secrecy laws and co-operate on tax evasion.

These landmark U-turns by jurisdictions which have hitherto shown no interest in co-operating with the OECD have been prompted by the forthcoming G20 summit, according to international sources.

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