Morocco Launches Sweeping Tax Audit of Bank Accounts to Combat Evasion

Relying on regulatory provisions authorizing them to access information held by these institutions, as well as by insurance companies, the inspectors of the Directorate General of Taxes (DGI) are conducting a vast operation of control and verification of the bank accounts of taxpayers, reports the Arabic daily Assabah. This operation is part of the commitments made by Morocco within the framework of the international conventions to which it has subscribed. DGI inspectors are looking for information on financial investments, life insurance buyback transactions, as well as sales or redemptions of financial securities. Thus, they go to banking establishments to ensure that they are actually complying with the regulatory obligations governing this area.

It is therefore up to the financial institutions and insurance companies to transmit to the tax authorities all the information used to identify the true beneficiaries of the accounts opened with them. Already, "the establishments concerned have asked their clients to provide the missing information in their registers".