Ambassador believes worst may be over in tax row

The United States’ probe into tax cheats hiding assets in Swiss banks has reached its “low point”, according to America’s ambassador to Bern. After the criminal indictment of Switzerland’s oldest bank, Wegelin, and its decision to sell off most of its business, the only way is up, ambassador Donald Beyer tells swissinfo.ch. Beyer says the tax dispute has easily been his biggest challenge in his two and a half years on the job in Switzerland – and would continue to be his “number one priority”. He notes that, “like the canary in the coal mine”, Switzerland was the first country to raise issues about the fall-out of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (Fatca). That coupled with Swiss bank’s rejection of some US citizens as clients, saw around 100 Americans in Switzerland give up their US citizenship in the past year. Meanwhile, over 11,000 Swiss applied for the US Green Card Lottery. swissinfo.ch: The US tax probe has been dominating the Swiss-US relationship of ...