Reply #6: AIG's Offshore Strategies Hide a Scam [View All]

[Octafish]

Don't We the People now OWN these guys?
We should, our Representatives gave AIG a $150 billion golden parachute...

FINANCE-US: AIG's Offshore Strategies Hide a Scam

By Lucy Komisar*

NEW YORK, Dec 19 (IPS) - The company getting the biggest U.S. bailout operated a scam to help clients cheat on U.S. taxes, regulators say. It is AIG, American International Group, the world's largest insurance conglomerate.

AIG was run by Maurice "Hank" Greenberg. He was ousted as CEO in 2005 by the board of directors after the New York Attorney General charged him with fraudulent business practices, securities fraud, and other violations.

These charges did not mention a captive insurance scam that Greenberg, famous as a hands-on manager, would have been involved in approving. AIG took inflated fees from customers, set up reinsurance companies for them in Bermuda, and bought reinsurance from them, effectively giving their clients tax-free cash in that offshore island.

Would Greenberg have known that his company was writing such a tax-evading policy for the likes of Victor Posner, a notorious crook who was banned from public companies by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in 1988? Very likely.

The scam was discovered by Terry Mills who worked for a large insurance company in Delaware and was tasked to investigate the insurance of Posner's NVF Corporation in 1993. Mills found that the premiums were double the going rate. He said, "We were able to find them coverage in the standard market."

However, the Delaware Insurance Department did not make the scam public or take any action against AIG, which was so powerful that it intimidated government regulators. (The Delaware regulator who talked to IPS said AIG sent a private investigator to harass him.)

CONTINUED...

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45176

So. We the People got a golden something.



You are welcome, Kaleko.
Sorry about the indigestible salad.
It's too much for one plate to handle,
which means I very much appreciate your help.