Voluntary Disclosures Lead To John Doe Summonses For Information About U.S. Accounts At Zurcher Kantonalbank And Bank Of Butterfield

In a sign that the U.S. government continues to aggressively seek information on U.S. taxpayers with non-U.S. bank accounts, the government announced on November 12, 2013, that it had obtained a court order authorizing the government to issue so-called "John Doe summonses" for information on U.S. account holders at Zurcher Kantonalbank in Switzerland and Bank of N.T. Butterfield & Son Ltd. in the Bahamas, Barbados, the Cayman Islands, Guernsey, Hong Kong, Malta, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. The U.S. government will use the John Doe summonses to force the U.S. banks that hold correspondent bank accounts for the non-U.S. banks to turn over records on the transactions that the U.S. banks conducted on behalf of U.S. customers of the non-U.S. banks. The U.S. banks who will receive the John Doe...