Singapore Banking Corruption for Indonesia and Malaysia

On March 18, Indonesia’s Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati (above) announced that the country’s Directorate General of Taxation will go after Indonesian wealth parked overseas, saying data indicate Indonesians have illegally moved Rp1.3 quadrillion (US$91.3 billion) worth of assets outside of the country. Sri Mulyani doesn’t have far to hunt, and multiple sources say her US$91 billion figure is a relatively paltry portion of the total. She can send her investigators to Singapore, an hour and 50 minutes away by any one of 35 flights a day, where, according to a 2014 Cornell University Southeast Asia Program study, at least 39,000 Indonesians worth US$4.1 million each were residing “semipermanently” and had stored non-home financial assets. The study put the total amount of Indonesian money in Singapore at a minimum of US$93 billion. According to one study, however, as much as an astonishing US$380 billion has been spirited out of Indonesia alone – 40 percent of Singapore’s