A tale of oil, bribes and tax havens

Check out in the link below the article Giovanna Marcolongo*  and Diego Zambiasi** wrote for UNU Wider about how tax havens facilitate corruption in the extractive industries. 

In their working papers, the authors, looking at data for 119 countries, find that over the period 1990-2014, within six months of awarding a license the number of entities in tax havens increased by 11% on average. In other words, they found a link between the issuance of oil exploration licenses and the founding of shell companies, presumably to facilitate corruption. The increase was even higher if the licensing round occurred during an oil boom.

*Postdoctoral Fellow at the CLEAN Research Unit, Bocconi University

**Lecturer in Economics at Newcastle University Business School