Best of the Web: No. of rich expats enjoying Swiss tax perks rockets

More than 5,000 rich foreigners enjoyed special tax deals in Switzerland last year, an increase of more than 20 per cent in two years, officials have revealed.

The Scotsman reports, tax offices published the figures for the first time after coming under pressure to reveal the extent to which foreigners such as former racing ace Michael Schumacher and singer Tina Turner have benefited from the arrangement that most cantons offer wealthy expatriates. Full story...

Barclays has today cut rates on some savings accounts, while Nationwide has hiked its overdraft rates, even though Bank rate has been on hold for two months and is not expected to change this week, says The Times.

Analysts said the moves were a sign banks and building societies are seeking to boost profit margins while interest rates remain at a record lows. Full story...

The Premier League is preparing to use Sulaiman Al-Fahim's takeover of Portsmouth as a test case for its strengthened fit-and-proper-persons rule that is due for introduction next week. Al-Fahim, a charismatic Dubai property investor, announced on Wednesday his intention to bid for the Fratton Park club using his "Al Fahim Asia Associates" instrument, which he described yesterday as being "structured like a closed-end private equity fund."

According to The Guardian, a source with knowledge of the deal said Al-Fahim is the owner of the fund but that it had numerous investors who had pledged their money on condition of anonymity. However that will not wash with the league, whose chief executive, Richard Scudamore, has said: "We should know and the public should know and the fans should know who owns their club." Full story...

The Obama administration has riled corporate America by cracking down on secretive offshore tax havens. But now a big onshore refuge - Delaware - is drawing scrutiny, too, The New York Times reports.

Squeezed by hard times, states are pushing to collect taxes that corporations are avoiding through Delaware shell companies. Maryland has reclaimed $267 million in such taxes, including interest and penalties, and has assessed an additional $143 million. Full story...

The Prime Minister has been at the forefront of moves by the world's leading economies to curb the growth of offshore financial centres whose friendly tax regimes have made them popular with thousands of companies, according to The Telegraph.

But his mission has put him on collision course with these countries - which collect vital revenues from their financial services industries - and many of which are members of the British Commonwealth. Full story...

Luxembourg signed a new tax cooperation agreement with France on Wednesday that reduces the scope of its banking secrecy, one of over a dozen such deals it intends to reach this year to avoid being branded a tax haven, according to Reuters.

Luxembourg Budget Minister Luc Frieden said he hoped the Grand Duchy would have signed 15 double-taxation deals by the end of 2009 that meet OECD standards on information exchange. Full story...

Lleyton Hewitt has set up an overseas base in the Bahamas. The former world No. 1 and his wife Bec secretly bought a property on the Atlantic Ocean tax haven in February, says Australian Herald Sun. Full story...

A group from the Cayman Islands lobbied Washington this week to redefine the image of its banks and other financial institutions after President Barack Obama singled out the British territory as a tax haven, Reuters reports.

Tony Travers, head of the Cayman Islands Financial Services Association (CIFSA), argues that the islands are getting a bad rap, and he met with lawmakers, staff of members of the Senate Financial Committee and policy experts during his trip to Washington to say so. Full story...

Caribbean nations say they will be the economic victims of US President Barack Obama's proposals to collect more taxes on the offshore transactions of US individuals and corporations, says The Jamaica Observer.

Caribbean countries have spent decades building up a financial industry to serve companies and individuals from the US and Europe, touting low tax rates, a friendly regulatory environment and proximity to the US financial markets. Full story...