The Pandora Papers exposed the world to a problem anti-money laundering (AML) experts have known about for some time: thousands upon thousands of new shell companies, offshore tax havens, and secret trusts created every day to hide funds of the wealthy and powerful.
The investigation revealed the creation of these entities is the work of a small army of enablers—an offshore system that includes multinational banks, law firms, and accounting firms headquartered in the United States and Europe—who conjure up a Byzantine ownership network with the sole purpose of obscuring who is the true owner.
