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Squillions: How money laundering won

lrb.co.uk

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Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#151

Post by SkiFire13 »

UltraSane wrote: post #117
reconnecting wrote: post #67

The true crime is involving a multinational corporation in a transaction between two private individuals at the local market. I like cash because it's direct, and where possible I avoid paying by card because I don't want the merchant to pay fees to third parties. In Europe, most of the time, using cash doesn't imply avoiding taxes on the transaction, but having cash is essentially sovereignty .

I use a credit card that I pay off in full every month and I get 2% cash back paid for by interest other users pay.

Most of your cash back money actually comes from fees that merchants pay. In the US and especially for credit cards with cash back those fees can be quite high, and unfortunately it's illegal for merchants to discriminate against credit cards with high fees.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#153

Post by Anonyneko »

alberth wrote: post #135

> I haven’t even mentioned gold, which is used all the time in criminal transactions, let alone cryptocurrency, the single biggest recent innovation in money laundering . Curious how that line is received within the HN crowd.

Considering my country of origin is using crypto for sanction busting at an enormous scale, I just take this line as absolute truth.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#154

Post by roromainmain »

jcattle wrote: post #69
mike_hearn wrote: post #66

I learned a lot about the AML system many years ago and still have some books about how it works on my bookshelf. It's fascinating stuff. A few minor comments. My wife and I have owned and used 1000 CHF notes quite a few times in the past. The last two times we moved apartments I paid part of the moving fee with a 1000 CHF note. We've also bought furniture this way. Nobody was surprised to see this and the notes were…

I'm not suprised that in the swiss economy no one bats an eye at 1000 CHF bank notes. After all the swiss are historically known for being the classy alternative to launder and store your ill gotten gains from, for example, your stint as the dictator of an African country. But there has been some changes in recent years so I don't know how it is today.

The usual (gu)estimate is that 1 to 3% of UK GDP is exposed to suspicious foreign wealth. It is estimated to be 15 to 20% of Switzerland GDP today. So indeed, it doesn't make sense for Switzerland to limit circulation of cash or increase tracability.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#155

Post by cucumber3732842 »

margalabargala wrote: post #108
alibarber wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selling a car usually does require a report to the government. Why would the seller care what happens down the line to the buyer?

Because the legal system in most Western countries is set up that the seller bears liability for laundering money if they accept duffel bags of cash for a car without the same documentation a bank would require.

This is absolutely not true in the US. Are you trying to tee up one of those "the US is not a developed country" type quips that are popular around here?

A dealership may take issue with it but a private party accepts no liability by taking cash.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#156

Post by greatgib »

Th guy says that they don't know where the cash is so it is "obviously" used for money laundering...

But even for money laundering, the cash has to buy real things or it would be useless.

So a total sack of bullshit. The kind or lobbyist that are paid to propagate lies and fear in order to justify new regulations that they would like to pass to have more control. Might also really probably be pushed by a big electronic payment corporation or one of the big banks that would like to ensure to have the income of the electronic transactions and not the cost of managing cash.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#157

Post by Tangurena2 »

Fire-Dragon-DoL wrote: post #2

In Italy there is a very aggressive law against money laundering: if you withdraw more than 1k cash, it triggers a call to the police. I know it's the same if you do it over multiple days. I think it has been relaxed a little bit later on, but in Italy everybody does the "I'll charge you X less without VAT" (which is 23% in Italy, I should point out), so this is also fighting that.

Italy has had some very widespread tax avoidance. Retailers have to use thing called "fiscal printers" to print receipts. These printers store data for the tax authorities to download. There are also fiscal police who would fine you (the customer) if they catch you coming out of a retail place with purchases and you can't show them a receipt.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#158

Post by Matl »

Anonyneko wrote: post #153
alberth wrote: post #135

> I haven’t even mentioned gold, which is used all the time in criminal transactions, let alone cryptocurrency, the single biggest recent innovation in money laundering . Curious how that line is received within the HN crowd.

Considering my country of origin is using crypto for sanction busting at an enormous scale, I just take this line as absolute truth.

Sanction busting is an interesting thing because states are sovereign so if one state imposes sanctions on another, it's not illegal for the sanctioned state to do everything to ignore/bypass them, unless we consider the sanctioning state to be somehow above others/source of truth for what's legal.

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#159

Post by [deleted] »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #144
satvikpendem wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the merchant pays, although recently more and more have been handing off the 3% to the consumer by giving a lower cash price. But well, most people don't have cash so that's essentially a convenience fee.

The credit card companies tell you that the merchant pays. Cost incidence doesn't work like that. If every seller in a fungible commodity market has the same additional cost, the price is going up by that amount.

[deleted]

Re: Squillions: How money laundering won

#160

Post by Tangurena2 »

phil21 wrote: post #98
glitchc wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The short answer is yes. You can buy cars, trucks and tractors for cash. The more expensive the car, the easier it often is. Luxury cars in particular are routinely bought and sold for cash.

Not in the US without the dealer doing all the same work a bank accepting $100k of cash in a duffel bag would be doing. Plus filling out a suspicious activity report on top of it all. They might have a real hard time explaining to the feds that they truly did "know their customer" from a simple form and a photocopy of your ID. Some dealers might be willing to do this for you, but most will not. They will direct you t…

I used to work for GM as a field rep (in the 80s). There had been enough instances where finance managers skimmed/embezzled some of the cash (even before the feds required filing SARs) that dealers stopped taking cash as a policy decision.
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