I remember that in almost all the criminal-type shows/movies that I’ve watched, whenever the bad guys need to stash some cash, they do it in some of the best places in the world to do so – Swiss banks.Of course, it’s not JUST criminals (or dictators, for that matter) that open those bank accounts. A company whose business it is to open Swiss bank accounts for a consultant’s fee (or something like that) said that the vast majority of Swiss bank account holders are honest people who want to keep their savings in a country known for its stability. I was able to do a bit of reading on the matter, and found out that there are actually different types of bank accounts that you could open in Switzerland. The mythical Swiss numbered account, however, is what we are usually shown on TV and in the movies. Covered by a CHF 100,000 deposit insurance (that’s about $ 90,000 or EUR 68,000), a minimum balance of CHF 250,000 (around $ 224,000 or EUR 170,000) is required for you to open and maintain such an account. This account brings with it a personal,
long-term relationship with your personal Swiss banker, who should be able to speak French, English, German, Italian, Russian or Arabic. Aside from that (and here’s the kicker), you can use a “highly secure, yet easy to use online banking system to read your account statements and follow your investments online from anywhere, in English, French, Italian or German.”According to the banks, once you open a numbered account, you will receive an encryption device the size of a pocket calculator that will generate the access code needed to access the
system. This number is unique to your account and changes every time you log on. With this number, a personal password and your account number, you can access your account statements from anywhere in the world, 24 hours a day as well as send and receive encrypted messages to your Swiss banker from any web browser in the world. Can you believe it? I think the closest I’ll get to anything like that is a good criminal-type show or movie. In the meantime, I’ll just stick with two other things Switzerland does excellently – cheese and chocolate.[end blog no. 7; images from deviantart.com, by xadik, invaderzim1000 and meppol, respectively.]
1 comment:
nowadys, its not only the swiss banks - cayman islands is another. countries really do want to market themselves so more investments come in their economy - even if they are in dubious methods. say for example monaco. monaco is a tax haven since it has no tax. period. look at how beautiful the challets, yachts and fast cars dot monaco. somehow, these incentives really work and people with the big bucks put their money where they know they can get the best deals.
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