The Hidden World of Offshore Banking
Last year, the number of American millionaires fell by 100,000. Yet 200,000 new U.S. millionaires showed up overseas. Why? One answer may be that back in the1960s, the U.S. government encouraged American banks to set up branches in Caribbean hot-money centers and distant islands as an efficient means of attracting foreign money into the U.S. dollar. The initial aim was to help finance the Vietnam War by turning America into a new Switzerland for the world's hot money. Instead this policy succeeded in turning these U.S. backed banks into a flight-capital center for third-world dictators, high net worth individuals, large…