Gibraltar wins white list place

Gibraltar has vowed to ramp up efforts to share confidential information with overseas investigators, despite gaining a place on the OECD's white list.

The offshore centre signed tax information exchange agreements (TIEAs) yesterday with Finland, Greenland and Faroe Islands, bringing its total tally to 13. The move saw Gibraltar gain a berth on the OECD list.

The white list is simply a list of countries that have signed 12 or more such agreements, but a place on the roster is seen as an endorsement of a tax haven's efforts to comply with G20 and OECD recommendations.

"For Gibraltar this is not a 'numbers game'. We are committed to the underlying principles of the commitments that we gave," the government of Gibraltar said in a statement today.

"Therefore, in addition to these 13 signed agreements, we have already negotiated and initialled several more, which will be signed when the other countries complete their internal constitutional procedures for doing so.

"Our offer to sign a TIEA with whatever country wants to sign one with us remains open."

Gibraltar added it held fire on signing the agreements, until Switzerland, Luxembourg and Austria accepted tax information exchange principles to ensure " a level playing field" was established.