RNZ’s Gyles Beckford, Patrick O’Meara, Jane Patterson, TVNZ’s Lee Taylor, Jessica Mutch, Andrea Vance, & Nicky Hager*

EXCLUSIVE – Panama Papers NZ – New Zealand is at the heart of a tangled web of secretive shelf companies and obscure trusts being used by well-heeled South Americans to organise their private wealth, business affairs, and channel their funds around the world.

The extent of this country’s involvement in the global money-go-round and intricate asset management and protection industry is showcased by more than 61,000 documents in the leak of papers from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca – known as the Panama Papers.

The Consortium of Investigative Journalists and German newspaper series of reports on what has been uncovered so far, after only a week with the data.

It is already clear that Mossack Fonseca ramped up its interest in using New Zealand as one of its new jurisdictions in 2013, along with Belize in Central America, offering extremely private, zero-tax foreign trusts.

The firm trumpeted New Zealand’s top flight legal and financial reputation as “allowing for the speedy formation of appropriate mechanisms for wealth protection, inheritance and tax planning”.

That’s code for tax havens, and a Mossack Fonseca memo said 95 percent of the company’s work consisted of “selling vehicles to avoid taxes”.

New Zealand – A haven in the South Seas. Photo: 123RF

Mossack Fonseca wasted no time setting up the local Auckland branch in December 2013 and from then on enthusiastically chased business, particularly from Mexico, but also from Uruguay, Chile, Brazil and Ecuador.

New Zealand’s tax-free status, high levels of confidentiality, and legal security are seen as the virtues, but a common thread through Mossack Fonseca is the need to avoid any structure or involve people who will attract attention from our authorities.

Initially its business was done through an Auckland accountancy firm Staples Rodway, with the main contact being Roger Thompson.

But by mid-2014 Mr Thompson had left Staples Rodway and set up Bentleys Chartered Accountants, on the 13th floor of a Queen Street office tower. Bentleys is the registered office of Mossack Fonseca New Zealand, and Mr Thompson is one of its directors.

Who is Roger Thompson?

Co-founder of Bentleys New Zealand. Director of Mossack Fonseca’s subsidiary in New Zealand, and Orion Trust (New Zealand), a trustee company for foreign trust and companies, including members of Malta’s government.

Both Mossack Fonseca NZ and Orion Trust use Bentleys address at 205 Queen Street as their registered office.

Mr Thompson has more than 30 years experience both as a chartered accountant and a lawyer.

His OECD guidelines, the double taxation and information sharing agreements with scores of countries, and the Inland Revenue’s ability to seek information if need be, counter charges of New Zealand being a tax haven.

Roger Thompson rebutted any notion that the trusts and companies his company set up were used to dodge taxes, and said claims they were had been exaggerated.

“I don’t see NZ is a tax haven. I would describe it as a high quality jurisdiction for trusts with a benign tax system in certain circumstances.

“I think the assumption that all NZ foreign trusts are being used for illegitimate purposes is unfounded and based largely on ignorance,” he said in reply to written questions.

Read Roger Thompson’s full replies to our questions here

An Auckland University tax law professor Michael Littlewood has previously been in little doubt New Zealand is being used a tax haven.

“A workable definition … is that a tax haven is any country that wilfully allows itself to be used as a means of avoiding other countries’ taxes. By this definition, New Zealand is plainly a tax haven,” he said in a study last month.

The government’s response to the revelations to date has been to appoint a tax expert, former PwC chairman John Shewan to conduct an inquiry and make recommendations on the rules and disclosure conditions for the trusts and companies concerned in the industry.

Mr Shewan’s appointment was put under the spotlight for a period, but he’s since been left to get on with the job.

Prime Minister John Key said Inland Revenue would follow up any revelations from the Panama Papers involving New Zealand, but was rejecting calls for the industry to be shut down.

“It would be, I think be a dangerous decision to make as a knee-jerk reaction just to ban a foreign trust overnight, because we have very good tax rules, they’re integrated rules and they’re respected around the world.”

He said New Zealand was working with other OECD countries to shut down tax loopholes, the next step in that co-operation comes this week with London Anti-Corruption Summit being hosted by British Prime Minister David Cameron, which Police Minister Judith Collins will attend.

*The investigation into New Zealand links in the Panama Papers is a journalistic collaboration by reporters from RNZ News, One News and investigative journalist Nicky Hager, and with the assistance of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.