Panama Papers affairs, clarifications from Crédit Agricole

CLARIFICATION

After the publication of an article mentioning Crédit Agricole in Le Monde on 12 May 2016 in relation to the Panama Papers affair, Crédit Agricole wishes to make the following clarifications:

• Crédit Agricole's private banking business is not present in Panama.
• Crédit Agricole's private banking business is not present in any tax haven. It started to withdraw from non-cooperative territories in 2010.
• Crédit Agricole's private banking business does not create or administer any "offshore" structures for its clients. Such activities were wound down gradually and discontinued completely in 2015.
• The private banking business strictly applies anti-money laundering rules and alerts the relevant authorities in the countries in which it operates whenever a suspicion arises.
• In addition, for several years now, Crédit Agricole's private banking business has taken a proactive approach, aiming to ensure that all of its clients are compliant with respect to the tax authorities in their country of residence:
  • That programme was completed in late 2014 for French clients and in late 2015 for all other European clients.
  • For clients who are not resident in the European Union, the programme will be completed in mid-2017.
• Crédit Agricole wishes to stress that it no longer carries out any of these activities in any form, including via external providers.
• The information contained in the article therefore relates to a past situation that has been addressed and will soon no longer exist at all, and it regrettable that the information was presented in such a clearly misleading way.