Just Hide Me The Money

A government report criticizes Citibank's services to accused Mexican murderer Raul Salinas--and illuminates a quiet global boom in private banking

When Citicorp and Travelers in October 1998 closed what was then the largest merger in history, creating a $751 billion financial colossus, a piece of unfinished business kept resurfacing like a bad odor amid the celebrations and predictions of imminent world dominion. This was the so-called Salinas affair, the curious tale of how a resourceful Citibanker named Amy Elliott helped Raul Salinas move some $100 million into untraceable accounts owned by offshore "trusts" that were in turn owned by dummy corporations in the Cayman Islands.

Salinas, the once high-living brother of disgraced former Mexican President Carlos Salinas, has been jailed in...

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