Switzerland Grows into Global Commodities Hub
Alexander Jung & Anne Seith
Der Speigel
06/29/2012
Switzerland has quietly developed into the global center of commodities trading. Critics say the industry's business practices in countries such as Congo and Zambia are immoral, and that it puts profits before people.
Ivan Glasenberg usually wakes up at 5 a.m., goes jogging or swimming and then goes to the office, not returning home until late in the evening. The taxes he pays make up two-thirds of total tax revenues in his town. His angular villa on a side street, with its brown coat of paint, blends well with its surroundings in Rüschlikon, an idyllic, picture-postcard little town on Lake Zurich. Glasenberg, CEO of the commodities giant Glencore, is actually a pleasant neighbor.
He is not the town's only wealthy resident. Rüschlikon, which has 5,200 inhabitants, is also home to a number of executives, bankers and even a Greek ship owner. But the Glencore CEO multiplied his assets last year through the initial public offering of his company, of which he owns 16 percent. As a result, Glasenberg paid the equivalent of €290 million ($361 million) in taxes to the town and the surrounding canton.
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Read it all here: http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/commodities-companies-flock-to-switzerland-for-tax-breaks-a-841287.html
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