Offshore A-Z is a digital repository of companies operating across major tax havens. Offshore A-Z exploits the inscrutability of such companies to speculate on their possible nature and intent. Each company listed on here is real, but the information surrounding these consist of both actual records, obtained by dmstfctn, and speculative images and mission statements, generated by algorithms.

Tax havens, or secrecy jurisdictions, employ laws and corporate regulations different from those of most jurisdictions, using secrecy as a prime tool. Furthermore, the agents operating offshore on behalf of clients elsewhere have been observed by dmstfctn to willfully introduce mistakes in the records held on the companies they help forming. (Offshore Investigation Vehicle)

When offshore companies are but a bundle of papers held in private storages, these practices contribute to a number of possible configurations of any given offshore company, whose records are at once factually correct and conveniently flawed.

Offshore A-Z plays with the idea that truth is not one nor static, and that it does not need to be upheld equally at all times or in all fora.

Obtaining the data

The data contained within Offshore A-Z comes from a number of sources. Prior to the Offshore Leaks, the snippets of information available on offshore companies were largely confined to the outdated online registrars kept by tax havens, as an empty gesture towards transparency. Employing data scraping techniques, dmstfctn extracted records on hundreds of thousands of companies appearing in a number of such registrars.

Yielding varying amounts of information, and naturally full of gaps - sometimes full company details and descriptions, sometimes little more than a name - the records were cross referenced with data from the ICIJ’s Offshore Leaks as well as Financial Secrecy Index scores from the Tax Justice Network, and compiled into a single searchable database.

Training the algorithms

Algorithms were then trained to fill in the gaps in information. Using keywords from the company’s records as a trigger, the algorithms associate images with each nondescript company and complete missing fields by guessing possible incorporation dates or by generating corporate mission statement via a simple neural network. The coherency and accuracy of the neural network is directly undermined by the opaque source material, or incomplete input records. Finally, companies previously named in the Offshore Leaks ( for example) are hyperlinked to the relevant entry on the ICIJ database, allowing user to investigate further.

Compiling the template

The resulting information is autonomously built into a Web 2.0 page, employing a visual grammar similar to that used by existing registrars of companies. However, under intense scrutiny, the template mealts away revealing warm hues and floating forms.

This cycle of actions is repeated for each unreleased company found in the database and publicly announced by a Twitter bot.

Zooming in

Among the companies listed on the Offshore A-Z, a few appearing to be embedded in complex offshore vehicles were further investigated, resulting in three stories focusing on the funding behind Leave.EU, the corporate tax-avoidance of Barclays and the colonial origins of HSBC.

Offshore A-Z is a project by dmstfctn.

STUNTS INCORPORATED INTERNATIONAL A.V.V.

Company Name STUNTS INCORPORATED INTERNATIONAL A.V.V.
Date of Registration 28th July 1990
Company Objective 1.    the acquisition, possession, management, selling, exchange, transfer, alienation, issue and trading in shares and other certificates of title to shares and bonds, securities, certificates of indebtedness, bills of exchange and other instruments of debts and of other stock, including, but without being limited thereto, to bear stock, to buy stock on security, to pledge stock, to conduct arbitration transactions, to conclude, buy and sell options, puts and calls, to participate in the issue of stock not quoted at an exchange, letter stocks and negotiable stock in property companies, either for own account, or as intermediary for own account of third parties.

2.    the direct or indirect investment of its resources in real estate and rights, the acquisition, possession, management, hiring, letting, leasing, leasing out, parcelling out, reclamation, development, improvement, preparation, building over, alienating, encumbering and operating real estate, including real estate meant for agriculture and stock breeding and the construction of roads, banks railroads, and similar works on real estate, all located outside Aruba.

3.    to conduct international trade outside Aruba, and to import and export goods from and to countries outside Aruba.

4.    the acquisition of:

i.    proceeds resulting from the alienation or relinquishment of the right to make use of copyrights, patents, models, secret processes or recipes, trademarks and the like.

ii.    royalties, including rentals with regard to films or in respect of the use of industrial, commercial, or scientific installations, as well as regarding the exploitation of a mine or quarry, or any other natural resource and other real estate.

iii.    conpensation for providing technical assistance.

5.    the acquisition, mining, production, preparation and manufacturing of, the trade in, (including the importation and exportation of) raw materials, minerals, metals, semi-finished and finished articles of whatever nature and by whatever name.

6.    TO CO-ORDINATE AND PERFORM STUNTWORK ON BEHALF OF AMONG OTHER THINGS FILM, TELEVISION, ADVERTISING ACTIVITIES AND THAT WHICH IS RELATED IN THE BROADEST SENSE OF THE WORD.

7.    to represent and promote the interests of third parties.

8.    to act as principal, agent, commission agent, manager, director and/or administrator of all that is related to the above or may be necessary or conductive to it.

9.    the corporation is authorized to do all that may be useful or necessary, or that is related thereto in its widest sense, including that participation in any other enterprise or corporation, as well as to perform as a holding company and to participate in other enterprises or corporations regardless their purpose.
Country
aruba
Financial Secrecy Index [more info] 68
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