????日內(nèi)瓦羅納大街上私人銀行林立，高檔手表店和古馳（Gucci）、愛馬仕（Hermes）專賣店散布其間。但這幾天，在瑞士生活和工作的美國(guó)人走在這里時(shí)心情并不怎么愉悅。

????上周五，瑞士和美國(guó)達(dá)成了一項(xiàng)里程碑式的協(xié)議，旨在杜絕借助瑞士銀行保密賬戶逃稅的行為。受此影響，許多外派到瑞士的美國(guó)人稱他們背上了逃稅的惡名，很不公平。

????對(duì)于確實(shí)通過瑞士銀行避稅的人來說，情況可能更糟。按照這項(xiàng)協(xié)議，銀行方面必須披露客戶信息，同時(shí)并繳納總額達(dá)到甚至超過10億美元（61.7億元人民幣）的罰款。就避稅者而言，相關(guān)銀行把他們交給美國(guó)國(guó)稅局或者司法部下屬稅務(wù)機(jī)構(gòu)的可能性比以往任何時(shí)候都高，如果出現(xiàn)這種情況，他們將面臨高額罰款和罰金，甚至遭到起訴。

????前聯(lián)邦檢察官杰弗里?尼曼曾追查過瑞士銀行業(yè)從業(yè)人員，現(xiàn)在他則是這些避稅者的代理律師。尼曼指出：“主動(dòng)坦白的銀行將被迫向美國(guó)司法部提交一項(xiàng)方案，而這項(xiàng)方案可能讓無數(shù)處于保密狀態(tài)的銀行賬戶曝光。”對(duì)美國(guó)國(guó)稅局來說，發(fā)現(xiàn)避稅者“就會(huì)變得如同探囊取物?！?/p>

????這項(xiàng)協(xié)議在瑞士引起了軒然大波。這是一個(gè)復(fù)雜而且極為獨(dú)立的國(guó)家，在這里誕生的銀行保密法律可以追溯到中世紀(jì)，蘇黎世還新建了一個(gè)公共車震場(chǎng)所。在美國(guó)加利福尼亞州帕薩迪納執(zhí)業(yè)的稅務(wù)律師菲利普?霍金目前受雇于那些在瑞士的美國(guó)人，他說這項(xiàng)協(xié)議是美國(guó)的“21世紀(jì)炮艦外交”。上周末出版的瑞士報(bào)紙則將該協(xié)議稱為“一次有組織的投降”，而且“既不情愿、也不體面”。

????尚未坦白交代的避稅者日子更加難過。雖然上述協(xié)議不包括目前正在接受犯罪調(diào)查的14家瑞士銀行或以瑞士模式經(jīng)營(yíng)的銀行，但它給這些銀行帶來了更大的司法壓力，其中包括瑞信銀行（Credit Suisse）、寶盛銀行（Julius Baer）和百達(dá)銀行（Pictet）。同時(shí)，該協(xié)議還向其余300多家瑞士銀行發(fā)出了最后通牒，要求后者和美國(guó)客戶以及那些幫助他們的律師和顧問劃清界限，提供這些人的銀行賬戶信息并繳納巨額罰款，否則就可能遭到起訴。此舉擊中了這些銀行的要害。

????最重要的一點(diǎn)可能是這項(xiàng)協(xié)議把這300多家銀行劃分成了三組——交出美國(guó)客戶就能免遭起訴的，沒有什么需要披露的以及遵守《海外賬戶稅收遵從法》（Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act）的。這是一項(xiàng)新的反避稅法律，非常繁瑣。

????除了這14家受到大陪審團(tuán)調(diào)查的銀行外，美國(guó)客戶對(duì)自己的銀行屬于哪一類一無所知。稅務(wù)律師指出，對(duì)其中那些可能蒙受巨大損失的人來說，他們會(huì)在三種辦法之間進(jìn)行權(quán)衡，第一種方法是繼續(xù)冒險(xiǎn)隱匿財(cái)產(chǎn)，第二是向美國(guó)國(guó)稅局坦白，第三是通過調(diào)整退稅金額進(jìn)行“私下披露”（quiet disclosure），但這種方法難度更大。

????白領(lǐng)犯罪辯護(hù)律師羅伯特?卡茨博格指出：“在人們看來，自己要繳納的欠稅、罰款和罰金不是太少就是太多”。卡茨博格的一些客戶也把資產(chǎn)放在了瑞士的銀行中。

????畢馬威和瑞士圣加倫大學(xué)（University of St. Gallen）最近開展的一項(xiàng)研究顯示，外國(guó)人存放在瑞士的資產(chǎn)估計(jì)為2.2萬億美元（13.574萬億元人民幣），超過世界上其他任何一個(gè)避稅天堂。但三年內(nèi)，那些著名的瑞士私人銀行可能會(huì)消失四分之一（圣加倫大學(xué)所在的小山城也是瑞士最古老銀行Wegelin & Co.的總部所在地，拿破侖曾是這家銀行的客戶。去年，該行由于為避稅的美國(guó)客戶提供服務(wù)而遭到起訴，現(xiàn)已不復(fù)存在）。

????Americans living and working in Switzerland aren't feeling much joy these days on strolls along the Rue du Rhone in Geneva, where luxury watch shops and Gucci and Hermes boutiques nestle amid a clutch of private banks.

????Thanks to a landmark settlement last Friday between Switzerland and the U.S. designed to shut down tax evasion through secret accounts at Swiss banks, scores of expats say they've been unfairly branded as unsavory tax dodgers.

????The picture for actual tax evaders through Swiss banks is even uglier. Under the terms of the deal, in which banks are required to disclose client data and pay fines totaling as much as $1 billion or more, such persons stand a greater chance than ever of being outed by their banks to the Internal Revenue Service and tax division of the Justice Department, where they face onerous fines and penalties, and, possibly, prosecution.

????"Banks that come forward will be forced to provide a blueprint to the Justice Department, which will lead to the divulgence of countless undisclosed bank accounts," said Jeffrey Neiman, a former federal prosecutor who once hunted Swiss bankers and now represents their tax-evading clients. For the IRS, finding tax evaders "will now be like shooting fish in a barrel."

????The settlement is unsettling to Switzerland, a complex, fiercely independent country that is home both to bank secrecy laws dating to the Middle Ages and a new drive-in sex facility in Zurich. Philip Hodgen, an American tax lawyer in Pasadena, Calif., with expatriate clients, called the settlement "21st century gunboat diplomacy" on the part of the U.S., and over the weekend Swiss newspapers called the deal "an organized surrender" akin to "swallowing toads."

????American clients who have not yet fessed up are feeling even more pain. While the settlement does not cover 14 Swiss and Swiss-style banks currently under criminal investigation by American authorities, it cranks up legal pressure on those banks, which include Credit Suisse AG (CS), Julius Baer, and Pictet. And it strikes at the heart of the rest of the Swiss banking industry, more than 300 banks, by offering them an ultimatum: Rat out American clients and the lawyers and advisers who help them, fork over their bank data and pay hefty fines, or risk prosecution.

????Perhaps most importantly, the settlement divides those hundreds of banks into three groups -- those that can avoid prosecution by outing clients; those that have nothing to disclose; and those that are complying with a separate, new and onerous anti-tax evasion law known as the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or Fatca.

????Apart from the 14 banks under grand jury probes, American bank clients appear to have no idea which category their banks falls into. For taxpayers with a lot to lose, that makes the calculus of deciding whether to risk continuing to hide assets; to come forward to the IRS; or to make a "quiet disclosure" by sneaking in an amended tax return even more difficult, tax lawyers said.

????"People think they either have too little or too much to pay" in back taxes, fines, and penalties, said Robert Katzberg, a white-collar criminal defense lawyer with clients of Swiss banks.

????With an estimated $2.2 trillion in offshore assets, more than any other global haven, the Alpine nation could find that a quarter of its storied private banks cease to exist within three years, according to a recent study by KPMG and the University of St. Gallen (located in the small mountain town where Wegelin, the country's oldest bank, was indicted last year for serving tax-dodging Americans. The bank, which once counted Napoleon as a client, no longer exists.)?