Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries Over the Decade Ending 2009 Dev

Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries Over the Decade Ending 2009, Dev Kar and Sarah Freitas1, December 2011

“Last years report, analyzing flows through 2008, produced a figure for that year of $1.26 trillion. We anticipated that the figure for 2009 might be even larger. However, the global financial crisis and slowdown in world trade combined to reduce illicit flows for the last year of the decade to a range of US$775 billion to US$903 billion. These are still staggering drainages from the poorer countries of the world. The average across the three last years of the decade remains above US$1 trillion annually. We continue to regard these estimates as very conservative, since they do not include smuggling, the mispricing of cross-border services, or the mispricing of merchandise trade that occurs within the same invoice exchanged between exporters and importers. China continues to lead the world, with most of the illicit outflows occurring through trade mispricing. Following are a number of oil exporting countries, with illicit outflows evidenced primarily through balance of payments accounts.”

Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries Over the Decade Ending 2009 Dev

Thank you!