Ghana, Seychelles take steps to boost international cooperation against tax evasion |20 May 2015

Seychelles and Ghana yesterday became the latest jurisdictions to sign the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA), implementing the new standard for automatic exchange of financial account information in tax matters, developed by the OECD working with G20 countries.

This takes the total number of signatories to the Agreement to 54. Both Seychelles and Ghana set out how they intend to implement the standard in time to begin exchanging information in 2017 and 2018 respectively.

This key development further demonstrates that the standard is a truly global one, offering benefits to all and provides a change in the international community’s ability to tackle offshore tax evasion.

The Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA) is a framework administrative agreement used in conjunction with the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters. It was signed by over 50 jurisdictions at the occasion of the Global Forum plenary meeting on October 29, 2014 in Berlin, Germany.

The standard for automatic exchange of financial information in tax matters was endorsed by G20 leaders at the Leaders’ Summit on November 15-16, 2014 in Brisbane, Australia. It provides for automatic exchange of financial information on an annual basis.