Sixteen Thais were named in the Panama Papers leak but it is not clear at this stage whether they broke the anti-money laundering law, according to officials.
The Anti-Money Laundering Office (Amlo) is checking with its network of financial intelligence units in 150 countries, as well as the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, to help verify the information, Amlo secretary-general Seehanat Prayoonrat said in a briefing on Friday.
Amlo has already sent letters asking its counterpart in Panama and the ICIJ head office to help verify the names of Thai nationals and has received confirmation that they were checking.
"Initially, we found 16 Thais were involved, not 21 as reported earlier," Pol Col Seehanat said.
"There's no official information at this stage. To avoid violating individual rights, investigations are being conducted clandestinely."
Amlo was responding to reports that 21 Thais were named in the Panama Papers.
Another list circulated on social media contains the names of 780 Thai and foreign individuals and juristic persons based in Thailand. They are linked to shell companies set up in various tax havens for various reasons over three decades, and many of those companies are now believed to be inactive. It is part of the ICIJ database from 1980-2010 and was made public in 2013. It is not part of the Panama Papers, which deals only with offshore financial structures set up by the panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca.
In Thailand, Isara News is reportedly part of the ICIJ network but it has yet to report its findings in detail.
The ICIJ has promised to publish a full list of companies involved in the latest leak in early May 2016.
Referring to the old databas, Pol Col Seehanat said the 780 individuals and juristic persons on the list might have been investing overseas in search of higher returns than in Thailand.
Of the total, 411 were Thai nationals, 262 were foreigners and 46 juristic persons. If the 61 redundant names were removed, the total was 719. They set up 48 companies abroad and served as shareholders, directors or beneficiaries in these companies.
"Initially we can't tell whether these individuals broke the money-laundering laws," he said.
These companies had addresses in Bangkok and some tourist destinations, indicating foreigners might have registered them. They were Bangkok (418), Phuket (88), Nonthaburi (15), Pattaya (13), Samut Prakan (7), Hat Yai (4), Samut Sakhon (3), Pathum Thani (3), Surat Thani (3), Chiang Mai (2), Rayong (2), Prachuap Khiri Khan (2), Nakhon Ratchasima (1) and Khon Kaen (1).
The Panama Papers, which involves 11.5 million documents leaked from Mossack Fonseca, were released by a global reporting partnership of over 100 publications led by the ICIJ on Sunday.
The 2.6 terabytes of data detailing the firm’s financial dealings — leaked a year ago to Süddeutsche Zeitung, which then shared them with the ICIJ — cover offshore accounts and shell companies in tax havens including the British Virgin Islands, the Seychelles and Panama.