Greek public revenue: looking for money laundering and major tax evasion

Hundreds of cases involving fraud and cases of major tax evasion and money laundering are being investigated by the Independent Authority for Public Revenue-AADE auditors and the Anti-Money Laundering Authority.

According to the AADE data, in 2022 the tax authorities sent to the Anti-Money Laundering Authority, 980 cases of taxpayers who are accused of major tax evasion or have left debts to the Tax Office, in order to be investigated for money laundering, while the Authority on its part , requested from AADE information on 496 persons, who are suspected of money laundering.

For this year, the tax control mechanism has launched the investigation of at least 900 cases of major tax evasion and VAT fraud. Of these cases, 470 are related to the opening of bank accounts, processing of seized data and files, circuits of issuing and receiving fictitious tax data, 170 concern the field of e-commerce, order-taking platforms, mediation platforms in the provision of accommodation services and in general the electronic businesses, while at least 155 relate to intra-Community VAT fraud.

The data

According to AADE data for the period January – December 2022:

– The tax authorities sent 376 cases for proven tax evasion to the Anti-Money Laundering Authority for money laundering, with those liable to be investigated for money laundering.

– 376 cases of individuals or legal entities accused of proven tax evasion of more than 50,000 euros or a total of 1.57 billion were referred to the Anti-Money Laundering Authority. euro.

– 604 taxpayers were referred, with debts to the Tax Office totaling 552.5 million euros. Each owes more than 50,000 euros and all will be checked for possible involvement in money laundering.

– The Anti-Money Laundering Authority has sent AADE requests for information on a total of 496 persons involved in money laundering cases, and is asking the tax authorities for information on the income and assets they declare to the tax authorities in order to continue in depth the research. The 496 persons targeted by the Authority resulted from the investigation of only 104 cases.

The information

The Anti-Money Laundering Authority receives information and makes use of suspicious transaction reports from police, tax, customs, judicial and other authorities from abroad or domestically and from any source. Information about suspicious transactions is sent by:

a) Credit institutions and every creditor of Law 4438/2016 (A΄ 220).

b) Financial institutions.

c) Chartered auditors and accountants and companies of chartered auditors registered in the public register of the Accounting Standardization and Audit Committee, as well as private auditors.

d) The external accountants – tax experts and the legal entities providing accounting – tax services.

e) Notaries and lawyers when they participate, acting in the name and on behalf of their clients, in financial or real estate transactions and when they help plan or conduct transactions for their clients.

Deactivation of VAT number

In 2022, the Internal Revenue Service completed 176 VAT fraud investigations, while another 175 new cases are under investigation. The investigations reveal natural and legal persons characterized as “disappeared traders”. Last year the tax authorities proceeded to deactivate 147 Tax ID Numbers (ΤΙΝs) when in 2021 they had deactivated 139 TINs and in 2020 144 TINs for VAT fraud.