Italy’s Tax Dodgers Hide in a Swiss Loophole

Italians who want to stash their riches out of reach of tax collectors might familiarize themselves with a restaurant on the Via della Posta in the Swiss town of Locarno, about 6 miles from the Italian border. One floor above Ristorante Pasta e Ravioli is the office of safe-deposit-box company Gestisafe, whose website boasts that it can offer “a service comparable to a bank but free from the stringent rules governing the sector.”

Gestisafe, founded in 2009, and its growing number of rivals aren’t subject to the rules of Switzerland’s financial regulator, which require banks to report “suspicious financial activity” to MROS, the Swiss Money Laundering Reporting Office. MROS says “that may involve illegal money or criminal organizations” or “terrorist financing.”