How to Pierce the Corporate Veil and Break Through an Offshore Corporation /...

This article is intended to explain how one can break through a multi-layered asset protection plan.  Sadly we have discovered most offshore asset protection law firms do NOT pay attention to details.  These details can be used to crack an asset protection structure.  As a leading offshore asset protection law firm, we will also explain how to protect yourself.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Many of the techniques laid out in this article are illegal in most countries.  Unfortunately many investigators will not follow the law.  As such we include these techniques so that you are aware.  The style of this article is a "How To" break an offshore structure and the corresponding "How To" protect yourself.  In no way are we advocating doing anything illegal.  We are simply explaining "how its done" so you can protect yourself.

Finding the Law Firm, Bank & Corporation Name

Technique 1: Phone Records will show what jurisdiction the target (person under investigation) has setup his offshore structure in.

You will need to employ a private investigator (PI) to get a hold of phone records.  This is a very easy thing for a PI to do and if you are not experienced in these matters please consider hiring help.  PI's are surprisingly cheap and can work with you on a per use basis.  Negotiate the cost up front and do NOT accept open ended deals.  Do NOT do business with any PI that tries to charge you by the hour or by any other open ended way.  This is the telltale sign of a bad PI and possibly a rip-off artists.  PIs have a fairly standard rate for everything you will be doing during your investigation of this offshore structure.

Once you have the phone records it is very easy to look for calls to/from well known offshore jurisdictions.  Once you have the phone number, simply do a google search of the phone number.  Remember to try the number in various well known formats.  If the number is an offshore law firm or an offshore bank you have hit pay-dirt.  Knowing the bank is very helpful in the next step.  If you only found the law firm name you can narrow the banks easly by calling up the law firm and pretending to be a potential client and asking what banks they can make available to you.  Be sure to ask what bank they are recommending for clients, since this is most likely the bank the target (person under investigation) chose.

Do not use your regular phone to do any offshore dealings with your law firm or bank.  Instead sign up for skype and use your computer to make phone calls.  A PI will have no way to know you are doing this and thus his search of the phone records will come up empty.

Technique 2: Email & Browsing Records

Again this can be done through a private investigator, but can also be done by yourself for a very cheap price.  This technique will likely give you a "mother-load" of information. 

There a many programs on the market today that can "spy" on someone's computer habits.  Just search google for "keylogger remote installation".  These programs will record and email to you everything the target is doing on his/her computer including emails, screen shots, web browsing history, even passwords.

With this information you will know, at a minimum, know the target's offshore bank's name since communication with the bank is necessary to conduct business.

Search "anti keylogger" in google.  There are many products, some part of a virus scanner program that you should have anyway.  Don't rely on the popular virus scanning programs though, because the software developers that sell keyloggers continually modify their products to evade detection by the mainstream virus checkers.  We recommend you buy a program that specifically targets keylogger detection.

Do NOT assume governments and their agencies will obey the law.  They may use covert means to discover information about you and then use conventional means to prove it.  If you have any doubts read about how the German government became a criminal entity by bribing a Liechtenstein bank employee to break the law and hand over the bank records illegally.  In fact, they paid a 7.3 Million dollar illegal bribe to the bank employee to expressly break the law and become a criminal.  What would happen to you or I if we were to make a 7.3 million dollar bribe for someone to commit a criminal act.  We would be in jail.  The German government is now a criminal enterprise, having compromised their morals and broken their own laws.  With this in mind, it is imperative, that your offshore asset protection structure be COMPLETELY LEGAL.  If all bank and corporate secrecy were to be lifted, your structure should be completely legal.  Most offshore law firms do not even consider the legality of the offshore structure as it pertains to you in your home country.  Don't just buy a corporation and foundation and think they are all created equally.  Again attention to detail is critical and can make the difference between a legal and illegal structure with respect to your local laws.  We can setup a structure for you that is compliant with your local laws.  Call for details. 

Follow the money trail

Armed with the bank name and other details it is now time to follow the money trail.  Why?  We need to know the name of the target's offshore company.  If we are lucky, the target only has a single layer asset protection plan.  In such cases, the target's money is in the bank account we are about to discover.  To borrow from the Irish, "The pot of Gold is at the end of the rainbow."  If the target has a multi-layered asset protection structure, don't worry.  Most offshore lawyers don't pay attention to detail and leave clues which we will use to discover where the real pot of gold is.

Wire records are not hard to get your hands on.  Most private investigators (PI) can get this information.

It's really amazing how a PI can get someone's credit report, wire records, and other supposedly private documents. Privacy onshore is a fallacy.  If you want privacy you need to incorporate offshore with a bank account in a high privacy jurisdiction like Panama. You also need to chose a law firm that understands how details make all the difference when setting up an asset protection plan.  To be honest, we struggled as to whether or not we should release this article.  In the end, serving our customer means educating them as to exactly how they might be attacked so they can protect themselves

Using a Money Exchanger to make following the money trail next to impossible.

We recommend that our client's use a Money Exchanger in Canada to make their profile look good.  This prevents raising any red flags, as it is very natural to send money to a money exchanger.  Many bank's charge almost 2% to exchange money, while a money exchanger will do the conversion for far less.  The real win here, is that if someone tries to follow the money trail they will only end up at the money exchanger, where millions of dollars flow daily to and from countries all over the world.  Our customers get the added benefit of an "early warning" if someone were to come snooping down the money trail.  Since we send many customers to this money exchanger, they have agreed to notify us immediately if anyone asks any questions about transactions our client's have done.  In turn, we would then contact you right away so you will know who is snooping around and why.

How to take advantage of sloppy lawyering - piercing multiple layers !

Most offshore law firms fail to understand how investigator's work.  Very sad, but true.  Most law firms will use the same resident agent for both the corporation and foundation, the same foundation council members as corporate directors, and will register the entities on or about the same day !   We will use this to our advantage.  First you will need access to the public registry in the jurisdiction you are researching.  Several jurisdictions now have online access to their public records with searching capabilities!  If not you may have to hire a law firm to do this search for you.

The first step is to find out the "Resident Agent" or law firm that created the company.  This is easy since you already know the corporation name from tracing the wire records in the preivous step outlined above.  Next lookup the date the company was formed.  Once you have the resident agent, you can then search what other companies or foundations were created on our around the same day.  Now take those foundations / companies and cross reference the company's directors to the foundation's council members.  95% of the time you will have a match and BINGO !  Now you know the name of the foundation that owns the corporation.  This is likely the jackpot, where the bulk of the money is being held.  Now you can target your legal attack against both entities at once.

Our clients are not subject to this kind of attack.  We use different resident agents when setting up a foundation and a corporation.  We use different directors from foundation council members, etc.  We pay attention to details when we setup an offshore structure.  Call for details.

Using the courts to find out who is behind the corporation 

The great thing about a court of law, is that it takes two to "tango".  When you launch a legal attack, the defendant must be represented.  Depending on the jurisdiction, in most cases, the real identity of defendant will be made known to you, often because they will show up with their lawyers to defend themselves in court.  Most people, once attacked legally, will assume you know their identity, otherwise why would you be suing them?  95% of the time the owner of the company will show up in court to defend the company.  And there you have it...  The identity of the person behind the offshore corporation.

Our clients are not subject to this kind of attack because the outer layer (the corporation) is not tied in any way to the foundation.  We use different resident agents, different directors from foundation council members, etc.  So there is no way to link the corporation with its parent foundation.  So any attack will only come against the corporation.  Since our client's only use the outer layer to interface with the outside world, and keep their nest egg in their foundation, a legal attack poses no immediate threat.  There is no need to mount a legal defence and give away your identity to the attacker.  Instead the attack only serves as notice that you may want to think about moving the foundation money since an attack is underway.  Any good asset protection plan should be setup in such a way so that an attack only serves as notice your under attack without putting any of your assets at risk.