Peter Kavelaars, Professor of Economics of taxation at Erasmus School of Economics, was a guest at the Dutch radio station BNR Nieuwsradio on Tuesday 21 January. The number of money box companies in the Netherlands fell by almost a third. This is partly due to the fact that trustees and banks have withdrawn the hands of Dutch private limited companies from foreign clients with a bad reputation, chased by the Dutch Central Bank.
DNB's supervision of the trust sector is becoming stricter and stricter. As a result, dubious private limited companies have moved from large trust offices to smaller ones in the last few years. Eventually, they ended up completely outside the sector. Isabel dos Santos, daughter of the former president of Angola, was unable to find a firm that was willing to take her private companies into his custody. Criminal investigations into Dos Santos and her husband are now ongoing in several countries. She's accused of corruption, but she denies everything. She claims to be the victim of a witch hunt.
Kavelaars says that the offtake of letter-box companies does not lie solely on DNB. The legislation of trust offices has been tightened up considerably. This has particularly affected small offices. Social developments also play a role. We believe that transparency is very important. Thirdly, tax developments have contributed to the decrease.
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Listen to the entire item on BNR Nieuwsradio, 21 January 2020 (in Dutch).