By Fred Abrams, From Asset Search Blog

A divorcing spouse may combine a number of elements in one scheme to hide marital assets.  As more fully set forth at my post Bearer Shares & An Asset Search, bearer shares can be one of these elements.  Bearer shares are negotiable instruments that for example, give their possessor ownership rights in a business entity.

There is no central registry of ownership for the bearer shares and the name of their owner does not appear on the face of the bearer share certificate.  Among other things, the bearer shares permit an individual to secretly own a shell company and use it to open bank accounts with complete anonymity.  The divorcing husband the subject of Bearer Shares & An Asset Search, had secreted millions in a Cayman Islands bank account maintained by a Panamanian shell company.

The Panamanian shell company  was controlled by the divorcing husband and his business partners.  As the diagram from Bearer Shares &  An Asset Search depicts, the divorcing husband  hid millions by combining elements consisting of a Cayman Islands bank account, a Panamanian shell company owned via bearer shares and a lawyer who secreted the husband’s bearer shares in a stock custody account:

Please see attachment

How can a divorcing wife or husband uncover a concealment scheme combining a number of elements?  These schemes can sometimes be detected through the use of civil law tools, financial investigators, etc., as described by my post A Primer For Gathering Financial Intelligence at:

http://www.assetsearchblog.com/2010/06/06/a-primer-for-gathering-financial-intelligence/

For more on this story go to:

http://www.assetsearchblog.com/2013/10/24/new-article/