Mormon Church fined $1 million for hiding $32 BILLION in investments over 20 years

[CitizenVectron]

Feds fine Mormon church for illicitly hiding $32 billion investment fund behind shell companies

WWW.NBCNEWS.COM

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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints engaged in the scheme for more than 20 years.

 

That'll teach 'em!

[Subzwari1987]

Cost of doing business carrying God’s work. 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

The church was fined $1 million and the investment firm that facilitated the hiding was fined $4 million.

[Bacon]

[GeneticBlueprint]

The Mormon church actually encourages you to replace the phrase “the church” with “Jesus Christ” when you feel you’re about to criticize it. So the headline should read “Jesus Christ fined $1 million…”

 

Anyways this never would have come to light unless a whistleblower said something in 2019. After the whistleblower did so, Jesus Christ moved his assets out of various shell companies into the parent company. 
 

The SEC is toothless. This is literally the equivalent of fining a penny on $100. 

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

34 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

The SEC is toothless. This is literally the equivalent of fining a penny on $100. 

In this case I think it’s a penny on $320. 

[GeneticBlueprint]

9 minutes ago, Spawn_of_Apathy said:

In this case I think it’s a penny on $320. 

I actually missed a zero. I meant $100 thousand. Ensign Peak’s holdings are in the $100 billion range of which the $32 billion hidden is only a part. 

[Captain Pickle]

What does god need with a starship?

[Mr.Vic20]

Bam, got ‘em! 

[Xbob42]

This would be an acceptable response only if everyone involved was publicly beheaded.

[Keyser_Soze]

All of that is for the protective booties they make you wear when you enter the Mormon temple.

[Chairslinger]

And that income is only a portion of money that makes up only one aspect of their dealings.

 

And it's not that all the other stuff isn't dirty, it's just that this is the only stuff we know about because it's the only stuff they have to report because Christian's don't really have to obey the law anymore.

 

But yeah, not to worry. If they are cheating with the financials that are actually reviewable I am sure the stuff that they know will never be scrutinized is on the up and up.

 

So if you thought the fine itself was an insult just keep in mind it's even way worse than that.

 

 

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

9 hours ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

“Jesus Christ fined $1 million…”

Seems like a big fine for a carpenter

[Demut]

Why are U.S. government institutions so toothless? I always hear about how the IRS is oh-so tough on tax evasion and yet this doesn't even qualify as a slap on the wrist. Is there some deeper reason, like how they wouldn't fuck with Scientology after those domestic terrorists started attacking the judicial system with a myriad bogus lawsuits and shit? When it comes to the States I basically never hear about the likes of the billion dollar fines that are regularly handed down in the EU. This can't all just be "rich people have more electoral influence".

[Kal-El814]

20 minutes ago, Demut said:

Why are U.S. government institutions so toothless? I always hear about how the IRS is oh-so tough on tax evasion and yet this doesn't even qualify as a slap on the wrist. Is there some deeper reason, like how they wouldn't fuck with Scientology after those domestic terrorists started attacking the judicial system with a myriad bogus lawsuits and shit? When it comes to the States I basically never hear about the likes of the billion dollar fines that are regularly handed down in the EU. This can't all just be "rich people have more electoral influence".

 

This hasn't been the case for like... 30 years.

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

They should have just taken away their tax exempt status. 

[Guest]

I don’t think this is a big deal and the fine is pretty well in line with what they did wrong. The underlying activity wasn’t an issue, it was just the way they reported their holdings obfuscated the fact that it was really one entity holding all of those investments.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

1 hour ago, Kal-El814 said:

 

This hasn't been the case for like... 30 years.

Unless you claim the EITC and you’re black in the Deep South 

[Demut]

2 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

This hasn't been the case for like... 30 years.

Guess pop culture has yet to catch up to this new reality then.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

Joe brandon also just got funding for 87,000 IRS agents to primarily go after the wealthy 

[Demut]

I thought that initiative got cockblocked by the Republicans. Am I misremembering this?

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

Nope they’re trying to defund the tax police cause they’re all tax cheats but it became law. The new house passed a bill to undo that   

[outsida]

Remember the Bible verse were Jesus Christ advised to hide assets from Caesar???

[LazyPiranha]

I don’t see a Caesar around, do you?

 

We’re dealing with people who invented fanfic about a fake gate in Jerusalem called the eye of a needle to get passed the whole “rich man entering the kingdom of heaven” bit.  It doesn’t matter what the book says, they’ll find a way to make it fit a lifestyle they enjoy.

[TUFKAK]

43 minutes ago, outsida said:

Remember the Bible verse were Jesus Christ advised to hide assets from Caesar???

You clearly don’t understand the gospel of republican Jesus. Render onto Caesar after you off shore and your options vest only!

[Guest]

It isn't a tax issue, the reason the SEC is involved is because public disclosure of equity positions for large institutional investors is an important part of functioning markets. By distributing holdings across a bunch of subsidiaries, the scale of the fund's holdings in aggregate were not properly understood by the market, even though the existence of the holdings were all documented in the individual entities.

[GeneticBlueprint]

There is a separate complaint filed with the IRS that does have to do with taxation issues, however. Involving the same entity. 

[Guest]

10 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

There is a separate complaint filed with the IRS that does have to do with taxation issues, however. Involving the same entity. 

To my knowledge, the complaint is not that the entity explicitly broke any tax laws in the way it operated, but that it shouldn’t be recognized as tax exempt in the first place because the intention of the sub-entity is not to distribute funds at a level deemed proper for a not-for-profit. The LDS Church takes advantage of quite squishy language on the part of the IRS in previous cases where they allowed such activity.
 

But it’s been a while since I’ve read up on the situation, so I may not be remembering everything correctly or there might have been something newly revealed since the complaints first surfaced.

[GeneticBlueprint]

39 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

To my knowledge, the complaint is not that the entity explicitly broke any tax laws in the way it operated, but that it shouldn’t be recognized as tax exempt in the first place because the intention of the sub-entity is not to distribute funds at a level deemed proper for a not-for-profit. The LDS Church takes advantage of quite squishy language on the part of the IRS in previous cases where they allowed such activity.
 

But it’s been a while since I’ve read up on the situation, so I may not be remembering everything correctly or there might have been something newly revealed since the complaints first surfaced.

Yup you nailed it. In its 25 year existence its funds have only been used to bail out a for profit insurance company and build a luxury mall. 

[Guest]

Just now, GeneticBlueprint said:

Yup you nailed it. In its 25 year existence its funds have only been used to bail out a for profit insurance company and build a luxury mall. 

It seems like the IRS needs to tighten up its rules about what must be done with funds in such an entity, the implications would reach far beyond the LDS Church or religious institutions generally though, so I think they would end up with many otherwise unlikely allies challenging the change.

[CitizenVectron]

Just make it so that no entities are tax-exempt. Bada bing, bada boom.

[Demut]

On 12/5/2020 at 1:00 PM, not CitizenVectron said:

Just make it so that no one evades taxes. Bada bing, bada boom.

Man, why haven't those stupid, corrupt politicians thought of that one yet ? Just get rid of all the loopholes!

[unogueen]

Govmnt doing a fire sale. That's a pretty paltry cut of business.

[GeneticBlueprint]

4 hours ago, sblfilms said:

It seems like the IRS needs to tighten up its rules about what must be done with funds in such an entity, the implications would reach far beyond the LDS Church or religious institutions generally though, so I think they would end up with many otherwise unlikely allies challenging the change.

Agreed. The person who worked there and reported them to the IRS seems to think there’s a pretty clear violation going on but I’m not a tax attorney. But at a minimum there are some ethical issues with it IMO.