Romney's undisclosed offshore assets, including Sankaty co. in Bermuda, hint at greater wealth

Set up in Bermuda in 1997, Sankaty served as Romney's partnership stake in Bain's Sankaty group, which invests in bonds, bank loans and corporate debt instruments. That first wave of Sankaty funds managed more than $100 million in investments in the late 1990s and early 2000s, according to a corporate analyst familiar with the funds. The analyst insisted on anonymity because the analyst was not authorized to discuss the funds publicly.

Since late 2003, Romney has left his financial decisions to what his campaign describes as a "blind trust" overseen by lawyer R. Bradford Malt, a longtime Boston legal associate. The trust was set up under Massachusetts law, but it's not a federally qualified blind trust which Romney plans to use if he wins the presidency. Romney does not oversee his investments under his current trust, but its general composition is made public and Malt invests according to Romney's political positions.

Romney's 2010 tax returns show him and his wife as sole owners of Sankaty. A 2011 Bermuda legal document lists Malt as Sankaty's president. Michael F. Goss, currently Bain Capital's chief operating officer, is listed as vice president, and Quorum Corporate Ltd., a Bermuda law firm, as secretary. Malt deferred questions about Sankaty to the Romney campaign; Bain Capital and Quorum declined to comment.

The candidate's 2010 tax returns listed at least 20 investment holdings besides Sankaty that had not been previously disclosed on federal reports. At least seven were foreign investments. Bain Capital Inc., the holding that posted the $1.9 million earning, was listed on Romney's state ethics reports in 2001 and 2002, when he ran for governor, but was missing from any annual ethics report until Romney's trust included it last month on his 2012 financial statement.

Sankaty is the only offshore holding in the Romneys' portfolio under their full control. On his 2010 taxes, Romney's blind trust filed an IRS form identifying Sankaty as a "controlled foreign corporation." That filing is required for any U.S. taxpayer who owns more than 50 percent of a foreign company. Romney's 2010 tax returns indicate that he and his wife control all 12,000 shares.

Several U.S. Securities and Exchange documents from the late 1990s and 2000s depicted Romney as Sankaty's owner at the time, but when he ran for Massachusetts governor in 2001 and 2002, Romney did not list the company on annual disclosure forms required by the Massachusetts State Ethics Commission.

The ethics commission would not comment on the omissions. Boston College law professor R. Michael Cassidy, who was a member of the commission at the time, said that if Romney "owned this business before he signed his ethics disclosure, then he was obliged to report it." The state's disclosure rules also allow a $1,000 minimum threshold. A six-year statute of limitations covering Romney's ethics reports has since expired.

Bermuda legal documents show that on Jan. 1, 2003, the day before Romney was sworn in as governor, his wife's trust acquired 12,000 shares of Sankaty. The transfer was not made public. The month before, Romney had placed his assets in the state-approved trust overseen by Malt. The move legally allowed the trust to describe Romney's holdings in 2003 only as "various investments and securities" without providing details. The trust filed similar disclosures between 2004 and 2007, the last year of Romney's term.

Romney's use of Sankaty as his partnership stake in Bain deals is documented in several U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission reports between 1998 and 2000. The company controlled 50,000 shares of Global-Tech Appliances Inc., a Chinese appliance firm that Bain briefly invested in. Sankaty was also used to manage 385,000 shares in the 1999 takeover of Domino's, as well as the $75 million investment into the Stericycle waste disposal firm and a $150 million investment in the US LEC telecommunication firm.

Romney was named as sole owner and president of Sankaty in several of those documents. Though no longer active at Bain by then because he had left to head Salt Lake City's Olympic Games bid, Romney remained a participant because of his partnership stake.

Even though Sankaty is no longer used for Bain investments, several tax analysts said its legal offshore status still could be used by Romney to defer some taxes on some of the "carried interest" income related to the Bain deals.

Romney has said he gets no tax break. He told an audience at a Maine town hall appearance in February that "I have not saved one dollar by having an investment somewhere outside this country."

But the lack of disclosure over the years, private equity experts said, makes it impossible to tell.

"Without knowing more about an offshore's history and how it was used," Fleischer said, "you're left in the dark."

Meanwhile stateside, President Obama's campaign didn't waste any time pouncing. Ben LaBolt, the Obama campaign's national press secretary, said in an e-mail that the report "raises serious questions about whether Mitt Romney established a Bermuda corporation to avoid U.S. taxes and attempted to hide it from the public." He called on Romney to release additional income tax returns to see "whether he created this shell corporation to intentionally avoid paying U.S. taxes."

Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul countered: "President Obama's attacks on Mitt Romney have been proven false time and again. As job growth slows, manufacturing activity stalls, and our economy continues to sputter, President Obama knows he can't make a legitimate argument for another term in office, so instead he is trying to tear down his opponent. This is just the latest example of President Obama and his political machine saying or doing anything to distract from his abysmal record over the last four years."

Rebecca Kaplan and Associated Press writer Josh Ball in Hamilton, Bermuda contributed to this report.

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[112844]

I HAVE SAID IT BEFORE AND I'LL SAY IT AGAIN AND I'LL KEEP ON SAYING IT !!!!!! MITT "TRICKY DICKY" ROMNEY

[occupy_cbs]

Ask yourself this question: what do you really think caused firms to lay off so many workers that unemployment jumped from 4.4% in May 2007 to 10% in October 2009 (remaining at 8.2% today), a sudden spike in business regulations and taxes, or a collapse in demand?

It is impossible to imagine that anyone truly believes the former to be the case, but I hear republicans including mitt romney saying that on a daily basis, leading me to believe they have ulterior motives.



=====
seabass6251: "To answer your question, it was uncertainty about the overall, future economy by consumers and businesses.."
=====




LOL! That has to be the #1 republican talking point - uncertainty - but just 'think' for once.....it's all about the BUSINESS CYCLE, and nobody knows what the future holds, so there is always UNCERTAINTY!

Even during the longest economic expansion in our history -- from March 1991 to March 2001 -- nobody was talking about doom and gloom except for republicans like "the newt," but that was early, in 1992/1993, when they said tax increases on the wealthy would stall the recovery and put us back into recession and cause unemployment to rise again. Obviously, they were wrong, and business and the middle class flourished -- actually everyone did very well, even the wealthy that saw their taxes increase. And, 22 million private-sector jobs were created even while outsourcing became prevalent!


So take your UNCERTAINTY republican talking point and shove it, and realize that it certainly was not "a sudden spike in business regulations and taxes" like mitt romney believes, that caused "unemployment jumping from 4.4% in May 2007 to 10% in October 2009".

But....it was a collapse in demand from consumers, and mainly from middle class consumers that no longer have that disposable income!

[occupy_cbs]

In reality, the reason we are stuck where we are is because the middle class lacks jobs and incomes -- something that will get markedly worse if we continue to try to cut government spending and balance the budget like paul ryan and other GOP leaders say. That's a fact!

[occupy_cbs]

seabass6251: "You would be much better off to study US history....Review the economy after WWI and the action taken by the government. See the immediate results of the federal government cutting the annual budget by half......Compare that to FDR's actions during the 30s when he increased government spending.."




Actually, it's YOU that needs to study history seab_ass, and understand exactly what CAUSED the Great Depression, and that FDR took office 3 & 1/2 years AFTER the 1929 stock market crash! YOU republicans sure have a need to re-write history, since it was republican economic policies that caused both the Great Depression and the bush/cheney Great Recession.

There were many similarities leading up to both catastrophic economic downturns -- with one being the huge income inequality that led to the top 1% owning such a huge amount of our nation's wealth.

The other things you need to understand is that hoover increased government spending by 50% in his own republican stimulus program while unemployment kept increasing, and that republicans passed the smoot-hawley tariff act of 1930, that many economists believe increased the severity and length of the Great Depression through republican protectionism.

Don't just 'cherry-pick' your version of history -- include it all!

Oh, and BTW, it was government spending that did indeed get us out of the Great Depression, as unemployment peaked the same year that FDR took charge (just like President Obama) and continuously got better, except for a slight burp in 1936 when republicans cut funding. The eventual end to the Great Depression was our entrance into WWII, and the huge government SPENDING. And, just like after WWI, government spending and the budget were seriously cut after WWII.

[newseer]

ROMMNEY IS JUST A MISERABLE TAX EVADER, THAT HAS BEEN HIDING HIS WEALTH IN SECRET, UNNAMED, NUMBERED ACCOUNTS IN CAYMAN ISLANDS, SWITZERLAND AND OTHER TAX-EVADER HAVENS IN THE CARIBBEAN AND EUROPE. IS THIS THE KIND OF PRESIDENT WE WANT? TAX EVADERS ARE ROBBING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE AND SHOULD BE PUT IN JAIL, INSTEAD OF ALLOWING THEM TO RUN FOR OFFICE TO CONTINUE THEIR CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR.

[occupy_cbs]

seabass6251: "You would be much better off to study US history"




Ask yourself this question: what do you really think caused firms to lay off so many workers that unemployment jumped from 4.4% in May 2007 to 10% in October 2009 (remaining at 8.2% today), a sudden spike in business regulations and taxes, or a collapse in demand?

It is impossible to imagine that anyone truly believes the former to be the case, but I hear republicans including mitt romney saying that on a daily basis, leading me to believe they have ulterior motives.

In reality, the reason we are stuck where we are is because the middle class lacks jobs and incomes -- something that will get markedly worse if we continue to try to cut government spending and balance the budget like paul ryan and other GOP leaders say.

[oeddie99]

Mitt's ass must get awfully jealous of all the **** that comes out of his mouth.

[TimeToEvolve]

Who wants this slimy slimewad to be the President? The Top 1% wants him as their parasitic puppet to finish the job of stealing all the money from the 99%. And some of the American people who are honesly too dumb to know better. Simple.

[occupy_cbs]

Easy seab_ass -- the tax code is written by the top 1% and their lobbyists, and benefits them more than any other Americans!

[occupy_cbs]

When mitt romney got brave enough to escape the cocoon of fox news, and appeared on Face the Nation in June, he added his voice to the chorus of those saying that economic recovery would follow if only we relieved the terrible burden that the government has placed on the nation's job creators: business. Were taxes and regulations relaxed, this would reduce costs sufficiently to allow firms to do what they are already dying to do, which is expand operations and hire workers.

If the demand for goods and services stays where it is today and we only cut industry taxes and regulations, there is absolutely no reason to think that firms would expand employment with mitt romney's magic wand. Rather, they would continue to produce at the same level and simply earn higher profits like their record profits in 2010-11.

On the other hand, if we leave taxes and regulations untouched but increase demand, entrepreneurs will happily add workers. And that is the root of the problem today. The bottom line, lost on mitt romney and many others, is that the real job creators are consumers. The direct route to reducing unemployment is boosting demand, not reducing costs.

Ask yourself this question: what do you really think caused firms to lay off so many workers that unemployment jumped from 4.4% in May 2007 to 10% in October 2009 (remaining at 8.2% today), a sudden spike in business regulations and taxes, or a collapse in demand?

It is impossible to imagine that anyone truly believes the former to be the case, but I hear republicans including mitt romney saying that on a daily basis, leading me to believe they have ulterior motives.

In reality, the reason we are stuck where we are is because the middle class lacks jobs and incomes -- something that will get markedly worse if we continue to try to cut government spending and balance the budget like paul ryan and other GOP leaders say.

[Eco99]

Let us also not forget the tax cuts have been in place for what 8+ years and what has it done for the economic condition. We have reduced taxes and increase spending (all under the previous administration) and they want to cut taxes more? Been there, done that and it failed, miserably. Also the regulations argument holds no water anyway. There are some arguments that regulations not only create techincal jobs but also tend to be protective of the public welfare (clean environment, financial protections, job safety, etc.). Nothing is more inane then arguments for deregulation alls it allows is for corporations to line their pockets even more usually at the expense of the middle class either directly or indirectly.

[occupy_cbs]

seabass6251: "General welfare historically meant roads, bridges, military, etc. that we all benefit from. However, social programs benefit the recipient only at the burden of others. That most definitely is not 'making sure that government works for all'".



Let me begin with the preamble:
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."


So now, you're trying to tell me the right-wingers like romney want to expand the military-industrial complex so much more than the quadrupling during bushworld, that they will also lump it into the "general welfare" category like you did, and not leave it by itself as "common defense"?

This is exactly why we are so screwed as a nation full of right-wing extremists as a screaming minority, so vocally against "welfare," without realizing the hundreds of billions we spend on CORPORATE WELFARE in the form of defense contractors and energy companies, especially since our military is the largest user of energy in the world!

Nice try, or maybe it was a Freudian slip, eh?

[Eco99]

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist."

Sounds like a recent quote concerning recent events ... but said over 50 years ago. Oh Ike how right you were.

[Eco99]

Hey occupy ... maybe their interpretation of "general" is not by popultion but by holders of wealth. They have to look after their welfare less the common man get smart and speak up.

[ParadoxisOK]

FOXNEWS, Murdoch, and Romney....dare anymore need be said!?

Peeuuuuuu!