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The Panama Papers  By  cover art

The Panama Papers

By: Frederik Obermaier, Bastian Obermayer
Narrated by: Simon Shepherd
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Publisher's summary

Late one evening investigative journalist Bastian Obermayer receives an anonymous message offering him access to secret data. Through encrypted channels he then receives documents showing a mysterious bank transfer for $500 million in gold. This is just the beginning.

Obermayer and fellow Süddeutsche Zeitung journalist Frederik Obermaier find themselves immersed in a secret world where complex networks of shell companies help to hide people who don't want to be found. Faced with the largest data leak in history, they activate an international network of journalists to follow every possible line of enquiry.

Operating for over a year in the strictest secrecy, they uncover a global elite living by a different set of rules: prime ministers, dictators, oligarchs, princelings, sports officials, big banks, arms smugglers, mafiosi, diamond miners, art dealers and celebrities. The real-life thriller behind the story of the century, The Panama Papers is an intense, pause-resisting account that blows their secret world wide open.

©2016 Frederik Obermaier and Bastian Obermayer (P)2016 Audible, Ltd

Critic reviews

"The biggest leak in the history of data journalism." (Edward Snowden)
"This is the inside story of how governments, corporations and organised crime groups have used the secret world of offshore jurisdictions to engage in systematic cheating and thieving. It's an almost perfect tale for the 21st century - the failure of democracy, the triumph of commercial power and greed, greed, greed." (Nick Davies, special correspondent, Guardian)

What listeners say about The Panama Papers

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highly recommended for the ears of the 99% and 1%

Sickening to learn that 1) the majority of native Africans [and those severely disadvantaged in other regions] are in their plight due to the amoral deeds of their supposedly elected leaders conspiring with crooked law firms and "The 1%" to steal the wealth of the governed and 2) that the financial crisis of '07/'08 could have been prevented if individuals (including corporations deemed to be equivalent to individuals with the 14th amendment of the U. S. Constitution) couldn't evade their tax obligations as to which the 99% must adhere.

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15 people found this helpful

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It was alright.

The book was like running full speed towards the edge of a cliff and jumping off just to find out that you jumped off the curb from the sidewalk to the street.

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7 people found this helpful

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Good at identifying the problem;terrible solutions

The story and details always point to government failures, corruption, and incompetence yet time and again the authors push for more government as the solution. They come out repeatedly attacking capitalism with clearly little to no understanding about what that means while advocating socialist tenents that they repeatedly admit resulted in the problems they are covering here.

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6 people found this helpful

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whiny

sounds like a child tattling on a bully, in general just annoying and a long rant

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5 people found this helpful

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People trying to avoid taxes, what a revelation.

Dry, overcomplicated, and could have been dealt with in 1/3 the time . So convoluted and un interesting I could mot get through it.

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4 people found this helpful

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Don't know about you but I returned it...

I'm not saying the story itself is not important just maybe the writers behind the story do not necessarily make a good storyteller ... Rather read the news reports on this

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Down Right Scary -- No Kidding!

There is so much information in this book that it takes a lot of effort and thought to keep the people and data straight. It is very disarming and troubling. It discloses substantial economic assets about the highest and most powerful world leaders from many countries. It's a who's who and how-to navigate and secrete treasures. The amount of funds attributed per person or company is too much to wrap my head around. Hulu has a documentary about the Panama Papers. It closely follows the book. I was glad that I had read the book before watching the documentary (which I saw twice). This is a worthwhile read.

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3 people found this helpful

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World's offshore finance mapped; big names named

Folks worldwide have endless reasons to make assets disappear from the jurisdiction and reach of the place they reside. Many have varied reasons to pipe those assets to shadowy destinations. In some (surely not all) of those shadows lurk ghastly arms transfers, big-time drugs, criminal networks, terror. Or, some well-off clients may have more pedestrian aims such as hiding assets from divorce, the tax-man, or other rightful owners (or, to be charitable, maybe some wrongful claimants). Imagine that huge lootings are going on of various resources in Africa. Yes, one can imagine mixed in here and there, a benign purpose such as not being looted of legitimate hard-earned wealth, from exposure in some places to some nasty political risk -- local chiefs always lurk to bleed the successful. Plenty of countries and characters have some mishmash of these things. There is a huge flow of wealth around the world "off the books." In the trillions, these authors maintain, citing other sources.
How edifying to these folks, to know there is a full-service law firm or two in sunny Panama to grease and facilitate this process. I had thought George H. W. Bush cleaned things up down there, in the Noriega days. NOT. We come to find there are whole countries whose business model is to facilitate this stuff. Some mighty big and rich. Many in the heart (or fringes) of Europe. Plenty just south of Florida. There are islands that must be almost sinking with all the bucks stashed there. There are inshore "islands": Nevada and Montana have, or had, outposts of this firm.

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A bit dull, but nevertheless an eye-opening account

I wanted to love this book, but I couldn’t get into it. It is written in a thorough, systematic and very German approach. Although the subject was interesting, I would find myself spacing out and not paying attention for big parts of this book. The narration didn’t help, either. Nevertheless, it’s an eye-opening account what actually happened and how messed up of a company MOSFON really was in helping so many of the worlds elite and shady characters hide their wealth. We can only hope that one day people will say enough is enough and do something about it.

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2 people found this helpful

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Finally, the details of this story connected!

Great work to all involved in putting this together. Thank you for protecting the interests of the public.

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2 people found this helpful