Expertise

International mutual assistance

International mutual assistance in criminal matters forms part of our daily activities. We have also dealt with a considerable number of cases in this respect. By way of  example, they may concern seizures of bank accounts or documents under international letters rogatory or under exequatur procedures resulting from criminal judgements.

Similarly, we are frequently called upon to deal with cases involving the intervention of the Luxembourg Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU),  in charge of combatting money-laundering and the financing of terrorism. Such cases concern particularly, but not exclusively, temporary seizures carried out by the FIU.

Furthermore, our firm becomes involved in matters of co-operation between prudential supervisory authorities (in Luxembourg, the CSSF [“Commission for the Surveillance of the Financial Sector”]), especially in order to assist our clients in the event of on-the-spot checks carried out in Luxembourg by the authorities of foreign countries.

In the past, the exchange of information on request with regard to tax matters constituted a favoured part of our activities (Art. 26 of the Model OECD Convention). This type of exchange has henceforth been replaced by a system for the automatic exchange of information based on the Common Reporting Standard or CRS  from the OECD. In no case is it possible to make a realistic evaluation of the transnational legal risks in financial matters without taking into consideration the OECD standards on taxation.