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 Prior to the Offshore Leaks, the snippets of information available on offshore companies were largely confined to the outdated online registrars kept by tax havens, as an empty gesture towards transparency.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.

A BEST REAL ESTATE N.V.

Company Name A BEST REAL ESTATE N.V.
Date of Registration 6th November 2006
Company Objective A. The acquisition, possession, transfer, management and development of movable and immovable property as well as the acquisition, possession, transfer and management of rights and interests relating to movable and immovable property;
b. rent, lease, sub-lease, granting of mortgage or otherwise establishing collateral rights on movable and immovable property or related rights and interests;
c. investing its assets in securities such as shares and other securities in respect of bonds and other interest-bearing receivables, by whatever name and in whatever form;
d. designing, calculating, collecting, executing and carrying out of construktiewerken including both private estates and public sector, rebuilding and restoration;
e. the performance of the construction and construktiebedrijf including metal and welding, plumbing work, masonry and carpentry and electrical installations;
f. providing architectural and engineering related advice and overseeing the execution of the works referred to in d;
g. providing services in project development by promoting the construction of immovable and movable property and the supervision and coordination of their exploitation, as well as advise and mediate in relation to transactions in immovable and movable property;
h. renting and leasing of machines and tools needed in this construction, repair and maintenance of buildings;
i. to conduct the management and supervise the implementation of architectural projects and associated technical equipment;
j. providing advice and provision of services in the design of buildings and outdoor spaces;
k. importing and trading of all those items, materials and products needed to build a building, as well as to organize. En. the setting of bail and other guarantees and transferring ownership whether or not in fiduciary or trust or mortgage, pledge or otherwise encumber assets, all this as security for the payment of debts more company and the debts of other legal or natural persons who are directly or indirectly linked to the company, whether or not for contraprestatie;
m. perform all actions related to the above, all in the broadest sense;
n. participation in other companies and / or companies regardless of their purpose.
Country
aruba
Financial Secrecy Index [more info] 68
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