Mossack Fonseca

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Mossack Fonseca & Co.

logo
legal form
founding 1977
Seat Panama City
management Rubén Hernández ( CEO )
Number of employees over 500, including over 40 lawyers
Branch Commercial and tax law
Website www.mossfon.com

Mossack Fonseca & Co. (Mossfon) is a former global legal services company based in Panama City in Panama . In mid-March 2018, the law firm announced that it would cease operations at the end of the month.

Business activity


Mossack Fonseca had 44 offices worldwide . The company was founded in 1977 by Jürgen Mossack as Jürgen Mossack Lawfirm , in 1986 Mossack teamed up with Ramón Fonseca Mora . The company specializes in business law and investor advice and offers a wide range of services for letterbox companies . Mossack Fonseca is one of seven companies in Panama that represent over half of the companies registered there. The company is considered one of the market leaders in the field of mailbox company services.

At the beginning of 2015, the Düsseldorf public prosecutor's office searched several Commerzbank branches on suspicion of aiding and abetting tax evasion. The Deutsche Commerzbank allegedly helped customers to create money in the accounts of the Luxembourg Commerzbank and to invest it in Panamanian bogus companies. For this purpose, the bank arranged an account at its Liechtenstein branch, which cooperated with the Liechtenstein branch of Mossack Fonseca.

Company lawyers acted as informal ambassadors for Panamanian finance and recruited investors.

Ramón Fonseca is the second vice-president of the Panameñista party , which is Panama's current president, Juan Carlos Varela . Ramón Fonseca is considered the President's closest confidante. Fonseca took a leave of absence as presidential advisor three weeks before the Panama Papers were published (see below).

Panama Papers

Mossack Fonseca law firm helped start over 300,000 letterbox companies in 21  tax havens .

On April 3, 2016, several international media, in cooperation with the International Consortium for Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), published several articles about Mossack Fonseca's clients and their financial constructs in tax havens . The articles were based on the group's non-public customer data that had been leaked to the Süddeutsche Zeitung by a whistleblower .

The Süddeutsche Zeitung reported in October 2016 that the firm was financially "at the end" due to the publication of the internals. Mossack and Fonseca were arrested in mid-February 2017. In April 2017, they were provisionally released on bail of half a million US dollars each, subject to conditions; the investigation on suspicion of aid for tax evasion and money laundering continue.

In mid-March 2018, the law firm announced that it would cease operations at the end of the month. A few employees would continue to be employed to answer inquiries from authorities as well as public and private parties.

Web links

Commons : Mossack Fonseca  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Mossack Fonseca Celebra el 25 ° Aniversario de su oficina de BVI . Panama Economy Insight, September 4, 2012. (Spanish)
  2. ↑ Mossack Fonseca  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on chambersandpartners.com .@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.chambersandpartners.com  
  3. ↑ Shells and shelves . April 7, 2012.
  4. ^ David A. Graham: What is Mossack Fonesca, the Law Firm in the Panama Papers? In: The Atlantic , April 4, 2015, accessed February 10, 2018.
  5. ↑ http://www.mossackfonseca.com/
  6. ^ How I learned to avoid the taxman in the British Virgin Islands .
  7. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of March 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ↑ Suspected tax evasion: raid on Commerzbank . February 24, 2015.
  9. ↑ PANAMA . Archived from the original on April 13, 2013. Retrieved January 3, 2015.
  10. ^ Fonseca steps down as presidential advisor. prensa.com from March 11, 2016
  11. ↑ theguardian.com April 3, 2016: What are the Panama Papers? A guide to the biggest data leak in history
  12. ↑ One Source, 400 Journalists: The History of the Panama Papers. April 3, 2016, accessed April 3, 2016 .
  13. ↑ Frederik Obermaier, Sebastian Schoepp: Scandal law firm Mossack Fonseca is "at the end". In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. October 23, 2016. Retrieved October 28, 2016 .
  14. ↑ sueddeutsche.de April 3, 2017: The end of a scandal company
  15. ↑ Frederik Obermaier: At large. The founders of the law firm Mossack Fonseca have been released on bail. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 24, 2017, p. 17.
  16. ↑ Mossack Fonseca goes out of business. Süddeutsche Zeitung, March 15, 2018, accessed on the same day.