London Bankers’ Tax Scandal Verdict Shows That Inexperience Pays Off
- Bonn court in part acquitted trader on tax evasion charges
- Prosecutors are expected to fight that part of the judgment
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In the first landmark trial investigating dividend tax trades in Germany, the two defendants’ gamble to cooperate with authorities paid off because it kept them out of jail. But the junior ex-banker played another card: that he was simply too inexperienced to know that what he did was illegal.
While Martin Shields and Nicholas Diable were convicted of tax evasion for arranging complex stock sales that cheated the government out of revenue, Diable was cleared of half the charges. These covered the first two years under review in the case, which charged the two men with tax evasion amounting to 400-million euro ($432 million).