Company Formation

A March 2025 Treasury Department rule exempting virtually all U.S. companies from beneficial ownership reporting requirements has created significant gaps in the federal government’s ability to combat shell company abuse, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has warned in a new report. 

The United Kingdom government warned it could legislate to compel its Crown Dependencies and Overseas Territories to adopt public registers of beneficial ownership if voluntary efforts continue to stall, the prime minister’s anti-corruption champion said.

Panama has enacted a 15 percent tax on corporations without domestic activities, targeting shell companies used by wealthy foreigners to shield profits earned abroad, as the country seeks to shed its tax-haven reputation and exit a European Union blacklist.

Company directors connected to Cambodia’s Prince Group, which the United States has designated a transnational criminal organization, have acquired millions of dollars in luxury Tokyo real estate.

Alex Saab, the businessman widely seen as the financial fixer for ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, was charged with money laundering in federal court in Miami on Monday.

Financial-crime authorities across the Middle East and North Africa hold powers that look adequate on paper but fail in practice, with anti-corruption agencies unable to freeze assets, prosecutors acting as political gatekeepers, and high-risk sectors filing almost no suspicious activity reports.

The U.S. Treasury Department on Monday issued an alert urging financial institutions to step up their detection of money laundering, sanctions evasion, and digital-asset transfers tied to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has removed Singapore from its enhanced follow-up list but the city-state’s beneficial-ownership safeguards, money-laundering prosecutions, and proliferation-financing controls are still falling short of the risks it faces as one of the world’s largest financial centers.

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) placed Austria in enhanced follow-up after finding the country’s framework for investigating and prosecuting money laundering remains weak more than a decade after similar concerns were first raised.

Accountants, lawyers and real estate agents in Australia will face multimillion-dollar fines for assisting the illicit tobacco trade under a sweeping expansion of anti-money-laundering and counterterrorism financing laws taking effect on July 1.