American Kleptocracy

An explosive investigation into how the United States of America built one of the largest illicit offshore finance systems in the world.

For years, one country has acted as the greatest offshore haven in the world, attracting hundreds of billions of dollars in illicit finance tied directly to corrupt regimes, extremist networks, and the worst the world has to offer. But it hasn't been the sand-splattered Caribbean islands, or even traditional financial secrecy havens like Switzerland or Panama that have come to dominate the offshoring world. Instead, the country profiting the most also happens to be the one that still claims to be the moral leader of the free world, and the one that claims to be leading the fight against the crooked and the corrupt—the United States of America.

American Kleptocracy examines just how the United States' implosion into a centre of global offshoring took place—how states such as Delaware and Nevada perfected the art of the anonymous shell company; how post-9/11 reformers watched their success usher in a new flood of illicit finance directly into the US; how African despots and post-Soviet oligarchs came to dominate American coastlines, American industries, and entire cities and small towns across the American Midwest; how Nazi-era lobbyists birthed an entire industry of spin-men whitewashing transnational crooks and despots; how dirty money has now begun infiltrating America's universities, think tanks, and cultural centres; and how those on the frontline are trying to restore America's legacy of anti-corruption leadership—and finally end this reign of American kleptocracy.

It also looks at how Trump's presidency accelerated all of the trends already on hand—and how the Biden administration can, and should, act on this tawdry inheritance.

Casey Michel cuts through the spin, to reveal the inner workings of the American economy. His writing has shown again and again the subterfuges and secrecy at the heart of how money moves through the financial system, and does it with panache, wit, and a blessed aversion to jargon. I always read his work, and can't wait to read this one.
- Oliver Bullough, author of the international bestseller Moneyland

Casey is the foremost journalistic voice in the fight against kleptocracy. No other individual is so consistently on the case and interested in both the actors and the possible policy responses. His knowledge of the existential danger posed by kleptocracy is bar none, and we rely on his work like no one else to inform policy.
- Paul Massaro, Congressional Policy Advisor to US Helsinki Commission

Remarkable and perspicacious ... an important and eye-opening book.
- Bradley Hope, New York Times bestselling co-author of Billion Dollar Whale