In today's Guardian, Little Jimmy is quoted as saying that the money is in a Bahamian bank. If he can prove that it came from China and not from the treasury, I will eat my shirt. Still waiting to see if Bahamians get paid and construction is started within the next 10 business days as promised.

Sighhhh. Disappointment again.

http://tribune242.com/users/photos/2016…

Did the money come yesterday???? I can hardly wait!! How come there is no big announcement of the money arriving? Both Prime Minister Crisco Butt and Little Jimmy Smith said it would be here by yesterday.

Cable Bahamas is a rogue organisation. The American purchases were a clever way of the principals fleecing The Bahamas and converting Bahamian dollars to American dollars. It was clever. Overpay millions for two small companies. Wonder who the beneficial owners of the small American companies were in the first place?

Sighhh. I suspect that you are right.

The scenario will play out this way:
(1) James Smith will point out that the money is "on the way -- dead good news, but just a lil late".
(2) So the gubment says that they will pay it for now, and when the money comes, they will pay themselves back
(3) the Chinese will not send the money and the gubment will hope that no one asks if the money has come in yet.

They haven't got the money yet.

But don't worry, it's on its way.

Waiting .... waiting ...

Why on God's green earth would they publish a list if the money has not arrived?

It's Hilarious if it weren't so sad. The idiot James Smith is publishing dates as to when cheques can be collected for Baha Mar repayment. The dates are different in each notice, and he admits that he doesn't have the money from China yet, and it was due today. More lies.

We will have our chance. His calendar shows that he is coming here from Nov 21 - 25th of this year.

Agree on the futility of resisting. However, the webshop proceeds are another thing. A very high profile webshop owner, (one of the originals) is exporting money and was mentioned in the Panama papers. Although the webshop transactions are entirely domestic, the proceeds of such are not, and that is the concern. American currency garnered from the webshops is stored in Panama. Even the webshop owners fear the consequences of a failed state.

The big question about the Economist article, is how much of the opinion expressed belongs to the freelancer conducting a vendetta and how much of it is offical view of the OECD?

There is nothing to fight for -- except the last remaining scraps of Latin American dollars. Our capital under management has declined by 80% in the past several years. We are damned if we do and damned if we don't. By not doing anything, we are forestalling the inevitable. By doing something (multi-lateral exchange) we will kill off most of our business overnight, but there might be something left to save from the carcass (or not -- it is unknown).

But I have looked into the this Mark Morris guy. Neil Hartnell was right to put the phrase "tax expert" in quotes. He is a self-employed "tax expert" who proclaims that on almost every single page of his amateur web page called the-best-of-both-worlds.com which I think was re-purposed from his 18 years as a financial planner (for expatriates as he says). Since 2002, he has hung out his shingle as a consultant. His big claim to fame, was that after an unsolicited proposal to the German parliament, he was asked to present and that made him a star consultant that he trades on ever since. It was mentioned that no one has heard of him in the international community, and that is true.

Based on his claim to fame, he probably gets gigs as a consultant to the OECD. Pascal Saint-Amans, who runs the tax division, is like any other bureaucrat who sucks on the public teat. He is lazy, and gets consultants like Morris to do his work for him, while he swans around the world, pontificating on his tax wisdom.

I rather suspect that Morris submitted the article to the Economist to get payment for the piece, with the complicity of Saint-Amans. I think that since Morris sent the Tribune an unsolicited email in a personal capacity, blasting the Bahamas for bilateral exchange, that he has a bee in his bonnet that migrated into a personal vendetta when his email was not given the respect that he thinks it should. So he is flexing his muscles.

I bet you that if Fweddy sent Saint-Amans an official protest note from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs demanding a public apology, Saint-Aman would buckle and say that it was Morris freelancing and it would be given. The note can't come from Hope -- everyone knows that she is a lightweight in this game, and everyone knows that Ryan is bullshitter.

Morris collects gig money from the OECD and his calendar says that he is going to be here from November 21-November 25th of this year. Since he is not a member of the OECD, for any business purpose he requires a work permit. It wouldn't take much -- a word from Fweddy to refuse him permission to enter the Bahamas at the airport, and that would put an end to his personal vendetta with this country. Just saying.

I suspect that he in fact was freelancing with the Economist article, and that a little bit of sovereign muscle will get Saint Amans and the Economist to retract -- if Fweddy would do his job.