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 Prior to the Offshore Leaks, the snippets of information available on offshore companies were largely confined to the outdated online registrars kept by tax havens, as an empty gesture towards transparency.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

SOL PALMERA REAL ESTATE

Company Name SOL PALMERA REAL ESTATE
Date of Registration 9th November 2015
Company Objective 1. for their own account or for developing reward, own, manage or otherwise exploit real estate, commercial and residential projects, also including, but not limited to, apartment complexes, shopping centers, offices and buildings in the broadest sense, as well as in general, all the services and facilities related to the operation and management of that business;
2. to acquire, possess, rent, lease, re or sublet, manage, develop, lease, lease, subdivide, drainage, develop, enhance, edit, cultivate and grow, sell or otherwise dispose of, or otherwise exploit real and personal property as well as rights and interests relating to immovable property, the construction of infrastructure projects such as roads, pipelines and similar works on immovable property;
3. the performance of the brokerage in the broadest sense;
4. for their own account and on behalf of third parties acting, including the purchase, sale, import and export, and transit, wholesale, retail, agenturen- and commission trade:.
a building materials and machinery in particularly construction materials and machinery required for the development of construction projects and land, tools, paint products, hardware, wood, tiles and various items normally sold in a hardware store;
b. all types of refrigeration and electrical equipment, including but not limited to air conditioners, refrigeration and freezers, water cooling equipments, restaurant equipment, pneumatic equipment, hoods, mechanic articles and electrical materials, as well as designing, building or doing construction and advising in relation to refrigeration and electrical installations;
c. all kinds of articles, products, materials, machinery, equipment and raw materials needed to construct a building and set up;
a and in so far in connection with the above work;
5. to represent, defend and promote the interests of third parties in the above areas, both in the widest sense and more specifically:
a provision of advice and the provision of architectural services, engineering, real estate and related fields.
b. managing and / or administering any kind of assets and also acting as a collection agency;
c. acting as an agent or administrator;
D. The design of buildings, interior and exterior spaces;
6. to participate in, cooperate with, the board implemented over or representation observing other companies and legal persons, whatever legal form. The company can only perform these activities in such a way that it can not be regarded as a trust office as referred to in Article 1 of the State Ordinance on the Supervision of Trust Offices;
7. investing its assets in securities such as shares and other securities in respect of bonds and other interest-bearing debt, by whatever name and in whatever form;
8. acting as finance and mediating in the realization of financing of all types of transactions. The company can perform these operations only in such a way that they do not credit system can be considered as a credit institution as defined in Article 1 paragraph 1 of the Ordinance Supervision. It is also expressly prohibited without exemption, to perform Banking transactions referred to in Article 48 of the Ordinance Supervision;
9. the provision of securities, in any form, for the payment of the debts of the company and the debts of others, whether or not contraprestatie;
10. partial or total building and / or secure a pension for the benefit of persons who conduct the management of the company and a significant belanghouder or former significant belanghouder are the company within the meaning of Article 11, paragraph c, at 10 of the income Tax Ordinance;
11. the performance of all work and all actions, which are related to the above in the broadest sense, arising therefrom or may be conducive thereto;
12. the above will be made to the extent permitted by and subject to the provisions under or pursuant to the relevant legislation.
Country
aruba
Financial Secrecy Index [more info] 68
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