The role of tax havens and offshore accounts in the ongoing financial crisis have gone largely unexplored. The American News Project reports that without tax havens this crisis would have been far less severe. From Bernie Madoff to the big investment banks a lot of money is kept offshore to disguise financial flows and asset accumulation. Not to mention evading government regulations. How can balance sheets be balanced if the money isn't accounted for?

That several of the big companies that have received billions of bailout dollars, like Citigroup, were also the most active in the shady world of offshore finance merits investigation.