Carbon credit scam could cost the EU carbon market €1.4bn

Twelve men have been accused, five are on trial, three standing for fraud, including a professional poker player, a French businessman and the Polish director of Consus, an emissions brokerage, for facilitating a €1.4bn carbon tax fraud. Through a complex structure of shell companies and offshore accounts, the French Treasury was defrauded of nearly €300m of unpaid taxes. Consus allegedly helped six clients sell more than 117m carbon allowances on BlueNext, a carbon exchange, co-owned by NYSE Euronext and French crown corporation Caisse des Depots; BlueNext shut down in 2012. Consus said that it had carried out both internal regulations and all compliance procedures required by BlueNext, received clients' VAT tax clearance from the French tax authorities and was a victim of "insufficient supervision of the CO2 allowances trading market, and of the loopholes in French and EU legislation." Authorities are investigating 15 other carbon trading VAT frauds in France, with this case the second to be heard in a French court.

The case of the skull ring: Poker pro, Polish broker on trial for French carbon “crime of the century”

Published 00:44 on May 4, 2016 / Last updated at 00:33 on March 8, 2017 / Bavardage, EMEA, EU ETS / No Comments

A trial of 12 people accused of carrying out or facilitating up to €1.4 billion worth of tax fraud in the EU carbon market kicked off in Paris this week, in a case dubbed France’s “crime of the century” and featuring a plotline worthy of a Hollywood film.