A police officer outside the Panama City headquarters of Mossack Fonseca, the law firm whose data sparked a global financial scandal.Image: EPA/EFE
A recent analysis by Oxfam estimates that around $3.5 trillion still sits untaxed in accounts abroad. While newly introduced regulations after the Panama Papers ensured that the number fell rapidly, a number of loopholes still exist.
April 2, 2026, 8:34 p.mApril 2, 2026, 8:34 p.m
Ten years ago, media professionals from over 100 editorial offices around the world jointly published research with political explosiveness. The so-called Panama Papers revealed how high-ranking politicians, stars and business giants parked their millions in shell companies around the world in order to avoid taxation of their wealth.
The origin of this revelation was a data leak in which over 11.5 million documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca were anonymously leaked to the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” a year before publication.
Assets are rarely taxed before information is exchanged
In addition to numerous legal proceedings and the resignation of various politicians such as the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan as well as the industry minister of Spain, the revelations were partly responsible for the implementation of new laws in the financial sector.
In particular, the introduction of the Automatic Exchange of Information in 2017 was intended to combat global tax evasion. Over 100 countries have committed to sharing information about foreign citizens’ accounts with tax authorities in their home countries, including Switzerland. The decision was the final nail in the coffin for long-held banking secrecy.
Studies by the US Senate, for example, showed that Switzerland was at the forefront when it came to hiding assets from tax authorities. According to this, around 85 to 95 percent of all US accounts at UBS and Credit Suisse between 2007 and 2008 were not reported to the US tax authorities. According to the Global Tax Evasion Report According to the European research institute EU Tax Observatory, around 90 percent of all funds invested abroad were not taxed before 2010.
3.5 trillion untaxed assets according to Oxfam
A recently published analysis by the development and aid organization Oxfam has now examined, based on figures from the EU Tax Observatory, how much private assets were still placed untaxed in foreign accounts in 2024.
The estimate is around 3.5 trillion US dollars, which, according to Oxfam, corresponds to 3.2 percent of the world’s gross domestic product – i.e. the sum of all services generated worldwide.
Figures from EU-Tax assume that around 25 percent of all funds placed abroad were not reported in 2022. This represents a sharp decrease compared to the 90 percent recorded in the years before 2010. The aforementioned automatic exchange of information plays a major role in this.
However, according to the European research institute, there are several reasons why assets worth trillions are still flowing abroad untaxed. Not all countries are still participating in the exchange of information, so there are still dozens of safe havens for financial fraud. Not all banks strictly adhered to the new requirements, as the EU Tax Observatory wrote in the 2024 study.
Regulation loopholes
A main reason, however, is that the system is only applied to financial investments and not to real estate values.
The researchers assume that around a quarter of the previously concealed funds in foreign accounts were now invested in real estate in order to avoid the new laws. It is completely legal to own property abroad. However, these must be reported in your own country and, if a profit is made from the objects or there is a wealth tax, taxes must be paid on them.
A study of the data from 227 local citizens living in Norway who own property in Dubai shows, for example, that this is often not handled this way. The researchers found that only 66 people reported their properties to the Norwegian state in order to pay income tax. Around three quarters kept this secret and thus avoided taxation.
Exchange of information also for real estate
The EU-Tax research institute therefore demands that an automatic exchange of information also be used for real estate abroad. Letterbox companies would also have to be prosecuted more closely: These would often be used as owners of real estate in order to avoid taxation of the effective owner.