China has launched a global hunt for hundreds of billions of dollars in unpaid taxes going back decades as Beijing seeks to fill a deepening fiscal hole by targeting the ultra rich.
Authorities have stepped up scrutiny of overseas capital gains and investments, in some cases going back as far as 2000, in a campaign that comes as Beijing also seeks to significantly expand control of outbound capital flows.
Chinese banks and other financial institutions have been instructed to review overseas investments by wealthy Chinese to check if income has been declared to Beijing’s tax authorities, according to foreign officials as well as Chinese bankers and family office managers.