Thread by @ICIJorg

NEW: The #PandoraPapers offer an unprecedented look at Wyoming’s discreet financial sector, exposing global elites who have abandoned offshore havens around the world for secrecy tools offered exclusively in the US state.

Our latest w/@washingtonpost: bit.ly/3e7mLPd

For years, anti-money laundering experts and law enforcement have warned federal and state lawmakers that suspect money was flowing into US tax havens.

Experts now rank Wyoming as one of the least restrictive trust jurisdictions in the world. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

#PandoraPapers show the movement of wealth around the world into Wyoming trusts, whose clients include:
♦️Russian oligarch Igor Makarov
♦️Kalil Haché Malkún—former estate manager to brutal Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo
♦️An Argentinian beverage tycoon bit.ly/3e7mLPd

Why Wyoming? The state pioneered the formation of limited liability companies, now a widely used financial tool that failed to gain legislative support in other US states in the 1970s.

The trust industry grew with supportive laws offering more secrecy. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

ICIJ’s @willfitzgibbon and @salwangeorges of @washingtonpost traveled to Wyoming to talk to Democratic and Republican lawmakers and trust industry experts about how and why the state’s secrecy laws expanded over the years. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

“There was a good deal of consensus in those days that we have to diversify our economy," says Phil Roberts of @wyoming_history on how local lawmakers saw trusts as a way to bolster a fragile state economy dependent on a long-declining coal industry. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

Wyoming is one of few places to offer private, family-run trust companies, a key ingredient of the “cowboy cocktail” — a coveted financial arrangement that @URLawSchool trust & estate expert Allison Tait likens to “a wrapped gift inside a wrapped gift.” 🎁bit.ly/3e7mLPd

Wyoming’s unregulated private trust companies, recommended for those with assets of $100 million+, have attracted families to move the management of their wealth from traditional tax havens in Europe and the Caribbean, to the state, #PandoraPapers show. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

But while Wyoming’s $31.5 billion trust industry has turned the state into a thriving tax haven, the hoped-for tax revenue hasn't followed.

The Republican legislature has rebuffed sporadic calls for a small tax on the profits of trust-creating companies. bit.ly/3e7mLPd

As Wyoming’s financial incentives have stood out In a competitive global market, lawmakers have taken notice.

It was one of several states condemned in a European Parliament resolution calling for the US to be listed as a tax haven after #PandoraPapers. bit.ly/3b2vbWl

US lawmakers and experts also called for more oversight on states that allow the wealthy to secretly shelter their assets onshore at a recent congressional hearing on the #PandoraPapers and the harms of the country's status as an international tax haven. bit.ly/3lOym9X

The #PandoraPapers previously blew the lid off South Dakota’s leading trust industry, and was cited in the Enablers Act, a major new US anti-money laundering proposal. bit.ly/32kHADQ

Our full investigation on South Dakota, with @washingtonpost: bit.ly/2YsHW9X

We’re keeping tabs on ongoing #PandoraPapers fallout for the US and other tax havens. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter to follow along: bit.ly/3bkNEOJ

💌 And consider donating to ICIJ to support this work. All end-of-year gifts will be MATCHED: bit.ly/3rCDtMb