Paradise Papers

The Paradise Papers are a set of 13.4 million confidential electronic documents relating to s that were leaked to the German reporters and, from the newspaper . The newspaper shared them with the, and a network of more than 380 journalists. Some of the details were made public on 5 November 2017 and stories are still being released.

The documents originate from the legal firm, the corporate services providers and , and business registries in 19 tax jurisdictions. They contain the names of more than 120,000 people and companies. Among those whose financial affairs are mentioned are, separately,, and , President of Colombia , and.

The released information resulted in scandal, litigation, and loss of position for some of the named, as well as litigation against the media and journalists who published the papers.

Background
On 20 October 2017, an anonymous user hinted at the existence of the Paradise Papers. Later that month, the (ICIJ) approached the  law firm  with allegations of wrongdoing. Appleby said that some of its data had been stolen in a in the previous year and denied the ICIJ's allegations. After media outlets started reporting on the documents, the company said there was "no evidence of wrongdoing", and they "are a law firm which advises clients on legitimate and lawful ways to conduct their business", and they "do not tolerate illegal behaviour".

Appleby stated the firm "was not the subject of a leak but of a serious criminal act", and "this was an illegal computer hack". The company added: "Our systems were accessed by an intruder who deployed the tactics of a professional hacker".

The documents were acquired by the German newspaper , which had also obtained the in 2016. According to the, the name "Paradise Papers" reflects "the idyllic profiles of many of the offshore jurisdictions whose workings are unveiled", so-called s, or "tax paradises".

The data breach comprises some 13.4 million documents—totaling about 1.4 terabytes—from two offshore service providers, Appleby and, and from the company registers of 19 tax havens. Süddeutsche Zeitung journalists contacted the ICIJ, which has been investigating the documents with 100 media partners. The consortium made the data available to these media partners using, a graph-database platform made for connected data, and , graph-visualization software. This allowed journalists across the globe to undertake collaborative investigative work. The documents were released by the consortium on 5 November 2017.

Companies named
According to the papers, (the manufacturer of ),, , , , , , , , , , , and  are among the corporations that own , According to , "Apple, Nike, and Facebook avoided billions of dollars in tax using offshore companies."

Apple criticised the reports as inaccurate and misleading, saying that it is the largest taxpayer in the world, and it "pays every dollar it owes in every country around the world".

Among the Indian companies listed in the papers are, the , D S Construction, , , , , the , , the and.

Apple
A great deal of the company's was exposed around the time of an internal  reorganization of three  subsidiaries. The company's 2015 showed a 26% increase, and close to $270 billion of s suddenly appeared in Ireland as the year began – more than the entire value of all residential property in Ireland. This may indicate that Apple took advantage of a tax incentive known as a capital allowance, which gives Irish companies generous tax breaks for buying intangible property – essentially intellectual property like patents. In other words, Apple (some suggest) transferred them to a subsidiary located in Ireland for the tax incentives, and didn't have to pay any tax on the transaction in Bermuda either, on the value it declared on the property when it sold them to itself.

Following a 2013 US Senate investigation, which featured testimony by CEO, Ireland announced that henceforth Irish companies would be required to declare somewhere in the world. Apple had been paying a lower rate of corporate taxes in Ireland in a so-called sweetheart deal. This attracted the attention of EU regulators as many multinationals were doing the same thing. As the tax break in the Netherlands came to a scheduled end, Apple's law firm, Baker McKenzie, researched island tax havens, asking Appleby officials in numerous jurisdictions to confirm "that an Irish company can conduct management activities ... without being subject to taxation in your jurisdiction." Two of the subsidiaries moved to and took intellectual property with them. The third is receiving tax breaks in Ireland for buying Apple IP from another Apple subsidiary.

The (JFSC) issued a Statement regarding Apple on 7 November 2017. The JFSC confirmed that the two Apple subsidiaries referred to by the media are not Jersey-registered companies and their understanding is that Apple funds relating to these entities have not been remitted to or held in the Island.

The JFSC states that it has not seen any of the documentation that the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) claims to hold following the Appleby data breach. If the ICIJ possesses data of a criminal or regulatory nature which relates to business activities in Jersey then the JFSC requested that this information is shared with them and, if there is any evidence of regulatory wrongdoing, then they would investigate and take action if appropriate.

The Government of Jersey (States of Jersey) also issued a statement of similar effect on 7 November 2017.

It is of further note that the jurisdiction of Jersey has recently been independently assessed as fully compliant with international regulatory guidelines on tax transparency.

The EU, under the leadership of, threatened to sue Ireland over its tax deals, although Juncker himself had approved similar tax deals in his own country,. Apple paid all of its taxes in Ireland as required by that country so Ireland is appealing the EU decision. HP, Nike, Microsoft and others use the same tax arrangements in Ireland, Luxembourg and other countries, but Apple is frequently cited as a media example. Irish companies are required to pay taxes in Ireland, but if they convince authorities that they are "managed and controlled" from abroad, the companies may win an exemption.

Apple now holds $252 billion offshore. However, Apple has previously publicly stated that it reinvests post-tax earnings (generated outside the US) into the global economy via investment funds held offshore.

Avianca
, founder of, is linked to an offshore conglomerate used for the aerocommercial with ramifications in Bermuda, Panama, and Cyprus. Efromovich used a Panamanian offshore that hid more than 20 firms located in tax havens. The conglomerate was used by Synergy Group's subsidiary in the purchase of MacAir Jet, now, aircraft company owned by Macri Group, for an amount of $10 million. Allowing Avianca to make headway in the business in Argentina. The Argentine government accepted this offshores as a financial to assign air routes to Avianca. The whole operation of assigning air routes is investigated by the Argentine federal justice system in a case called "Avianca" in which the  and other officials were imputed.

DST Global
A, , put $191 million into DST Global, an investment firm part of Group and was founded by Russian billionaire , which used it to buy a large share of  in 2011. A subsidiary of the Kremlin-controlled funded an investment company that partnered with DST Global to buy shares in, reaping millions when the social media giant went public in 2012. Twitter similarly went public in 2013. The US government sanctioned VTB in 2014 because of the, but DST Global had by then sold its stake in Twitter. Four days after the Facebook, a DST Global subsidiary sold more than 27 million shares of Facebook for approximately $1 billion.

Glencore
In 2009,, an Anglo–Swiss multinational commodity trading and mining company, loaned $45 million to Israeli billionaire in exchange for his help with officials of the  in negotiations over a  with state-owned  at the.

One of the Katanga board members was Glencore major shareholder, a former employee whose made him a billionaire in the IPO. Glencore, which had effectively taken over Katanga, agreed to vote for the joint venture. The loan document specifically provided that repayment would be owed if agreement was not reached within three months. Gertler and Glencore each have denied wrongdoing. Appleby had worked for Glencore and its founder on major projects in the past, even after his indictment in 1983. Rich was indicted in the United States on federal charges of and making controversial oil deals with Iran during the. He received a from   on 20 January 2001, Clinton's last day in office.

A separate ICIJ project found that tax auditors in accused a Glencore subsidiary of deducting from its taxes "fictitious" payments to other Glencore subsidiaries, and of selling the zinc from its mine (to another Glencore company) in unrefined form to minimize its revenue, which it publicly said in 2015 had not recovered from a 2017 downturn. Its CEO told shareholders before this that it expected a spike in demand, which did materialize. The mine is owned by Nantou Mining SA, which is owned by Merope Inc, a Bermuda shell company set up by Appleby with directors provided by the firm. Glencore sold Merope in April 2017 but before that it was 100% owned by Glencore Finance (Bermuda) Ltd, which was, according to a document from the Paradise Papers leaks, 100% owned by Glencore Group Funding Ltd of the, an entity in turn 100% owned by Swiss firm Glencore International AG, itself a wholly owned subsidiary of Glencore plc, registered in.

Documents were also discovered discussing Glencore's desire to keep its substantial stake in SwissMarine a secret, and that although the subsidiary's annual report showed of $1.9 billion in 2014, Glencore does not mention it in its disclosures to the  or any other public filing because, it said, it did not consider this a significant investment.

The Australian branch of Glencore has been demonstrated to have carried out some $25 billion in, complex financial instruments the suspects of being used to avoid paying taxes in Australia. The recently held that documents revealed in the Paradise Papers leak court be used by the  to assess Glencore's tax obligations, despite legal privilege.

Nike
Appleby documents detail how Nike boosted its after-tax profits by, among other maneuvers, transferring ownership of its Swoosh to a Bermudian subsidiary, Nike International Ltd. This transfer allowed the  to charge  to its European headquarters in, , effectively converting taxable company  to an account payable in tax-free Bermuda. Although the subsidiary was effectively run by executives at Nike's main offices in, Oregon – to the point where a duplicate of the Bermudian company's seal was needed – for tax purposes the subsidiary was treated as based in Bermuda. Its profits were not declared in Europe and came to light only because of a mostly unrelated case in, where papers filed by Nike briefly mention royalties in 2010, 2011 and 2012 totaling $3.86 billion. Under an arrangement with Dutch authorities, the tax break was to expire in 2014, so another reorganization transferred the intellectual property from the Bermudian company to a Dutch commanditaire vennootschap or limited partnership, Nike Innovate CV.

Dutch law treats income earned by a CV as if it had been earned by the principals, who owe no tax in the Netherlands if they do not reside there. One in six dollars of foreign earned by US multinationals was earned, at least on paper, through a Dutch CV subsidiary. Companies with similar structures include, and.

Odebrecht
Appleby managed 17 offshore companies for, a Brazilian conglomerate, and at least one of them was used as a vehicle for paying bribes in. Some of these offshore companies are publicly known to operate for Odebrecht in Africa and be involved in bribes. Among those involved in the operation who also are named in the papers are, Brazilian businessman and former Odebrecht' CEO, his father Emílio Odebrecht and his brother Maurício Odebrecht.

PokerStars
Appleby and various banks in the, including which is owned by  and , had business with  and its founders,  and his father , until it was sold for $4.9 billion in 2014 to , formerly known as Amaya. PokerStars and its founders by the  for allegedly  billions until they negotiated a settlement in 31 July 2012. The Stars Group along with its former member of board of directors and former CEO David Baazov also did business with Appleby. In March 2016, David Baazov and other executives were charged by Canadian regulators with multiple securities fraud charges related to the acquisition of PokerStars.

Algeria
, freedom fighter, author, and politician, appears in the Papers in connection with a trust in the Cayman Islands, along with a former energy minister, the family of a former foreign minister and their South Pacific holdings.

Angola
An opposition party,, called for an investigation into alleged diversions from the country's sovereign wealth fund. , a close associate of the son of former long-term president, has invested over $2 billion from the country's in Mauritius, according to Appleby documents. In a 20-month period he was paid over $41 million in management fees, and invested much of the money in his own projects.

The Mauritius Supreme Court later froze 91 bank accounts associated with Bastos as part of an inquiry into his investments for the Angolan sovereign wealth fund, and suspended the licenses of seven investment companies linked to Bastos' Quantum Global.

Ghana
, brother of former president of Ghana, registered a company in the Isle of Man to hold the registration for his private jet, according to Appleby documents. Mahama, the CEO of Engineers & Planners Company Limited, is also under investigation for allegedly issuing bad checks. In 2016, Ghanaian authorities took his company to court for allegedly not making social security payments. The case was later settled. Ghanaian Finance Minister was identified as a co-director of an offshore company with outgoing president of Liberia,.

Kenya
, member of parliament 2008–2013 and minister of agriculture 2010 to March 2013, owned a million-dollar flat near Harrods in London through an offshore she told Appleby was funded by her flower-export company.

Liberia
n President is listed in the papers as a director of the Bermuda company Songhai Financial Holdings Ltd. a subsidiary of Databank's finance, fund management and investment company Databank Brokerage Ltd., from April 2001 until September 2012. The Ghanaian Minister for Finance and Economic Planning,, was a co-founder of Databank and a co-director, with Johnson Sirleaf, of Songhai Financial Holdings.

Nigeria
, Africa's richest man with an estimated wealth of 12.1 billion, is also mentioned. President of the Nigerian Senate is listed in the papers as a director and a shareholder of Tenia Ltd., a company established in the Cayman Islands in April 2001.

Uganda
Foreign Minister is listed as beneficiary, along with his daughter, of a trust which holds the -based Katonga Investments Ltd. Katonga gave as its source of income Enhas Uganda, another Kutesa-owned company criticized in a parliamentary committee as part of a privatization it said had been "manipulated and taken advantage of by a few politically powerful people who sacrifice the people's interests". Kutesa was also president of the in 2014–2015.

Kutesa told the Daily Monitor he had never done anything with the company.

India
India ranks 19th out of the 180 countries represented in the data in terms of the number of names. In all, there are 714 Indians in the tally, including noted political leaders like, notable names like actor  (a shareholder in a Bermuda-based digital media company), former.

The papers revealed that Mallya sold to  in 2013, which it later approached London-based law firm  to restructuring the group structure created by Mallya. With three other subsidiaries based in the UK, United Spirits was allegedly involved with diverting funds amounting to $1.5 billion.

Indonesia
Two children of deceased former president, and  in addition to opposition party leader  (Suharto's former son-in-law) and businessman  are listed in the papers. The released a statement that they will follow up the information provided on Indonesian taxpayers.

Japan
Former Japanese Prime Minister is listed in the papers. The Bermuda-incorporated company,, is listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong and appointed Hatoyama honorary chairman in 2013 because of his "amicable relationship" with the oil industry, a sector in which Hoifu planned to expand. The principal shareholder of the company was Hui Chi Ming. , brother of, was a director (deputy chairman) of the company.

Kazakhstan
Former Minister of Oil and Gas is listed as an original shareholder of Meridian Capital Ltd. Former BTA Bank Chairman Mukhtar Ablyazov is documented for his ownership of Cayman Island-registered, which may have been used in his alleged embezzlement and mismanagement of $10 billion of BTA money. The embezzlement is one of the largest cases of financial fraud in history.

Pakistan
Former Prime Minister is listed in the papers, having set up a trust called the Antarctic Trust owned by a. Aziz, a former Citibank executive, told the ICIJ he had set the trust up for purposes and that the funds had come from his employment at Citibank. An internal Appleby document raised concerns about warrants issued for him in connection with the killing of a local leader. Aziz dismissed both the murder charge and the allegations of financial impropriety.

Austria
was head of the from 2000 to 2008 and Austria's chancellor from January 2007 to December 2008. He is listed as a director for Novia Management, a Maltese company listed as a shareholder in Novia Funds Sicav Plc, also -based, which includes among its other shareholders Tal Silberstein, who was arrested in 2017 with on charges of money laundering, then released. Silberstein had served as Gusenbauer's campaign advisor.

France
The French filmmaker is listed in the papers. As a result of the investigation, according to his lawyer, the filmmaker informed French tax authorities in the month preceding the release of the papers about his offshore holdings.

Greece
Mareva Grabowski is listed in the Paradise Papers. She is the wife of, who later became Prime Minister of Greece. She owns 50% of an offshore company, Eternia Capital Management in the Cayman Islands,. This match is verified in Appleby and on listed in Cayman records on 30 March 2010.

In total, 2.829 Greek names are listed in the papers, with a lot of prominent businesspeople.

Ireland
lead singer is listed in the papers as an investor in a Lithuanian shopping centre via a -based company.

Lithuania
, a Member of the, is named in the papers.

Montenegro
Ana Kolarević, sister of the former Prime Minister and President, who was in power from 1991 to 2016, is listed in the Paradise Papers.

Serbia
, n Minister for Innovation and Technology and owner of the Russian conglomerate has a residence in a wealthy  suburb, known for its tax shelters. The residence application and tax returns were initiated by, which handles offshore companies owned by Popovic. Those entities were also implicated in money laundering and tax evasion accusations, explicitly mentioned in the Paradise Papers.

Spain
In Spain, the first political authority that appears is the former and current councilor,, artist  and billionaire. Businessman, CEO of 1996 to 2000, registered two companies in tax havens.

Switzerland
Quantum Global Group, an investment bank owned by, managed the n wealth fund invested in seven investment funds in and received an annual fee of 2 percent to 2.5 percent of capital under management per year.

Turkey
The sons of 's Prime Minister,, are listed in the papers. The sons, both doing maritime business, officially set up two companies in, to avoid high Turkish tax rates. Both of the companies are registered under the names of the two sons, with the older son Erkam Yıldırım having more shares than the younger son Bülent Yıldırım in both companies. Companies, named Hawke Bay Marine Co. Ltd.(founded in 2004) and Black Eagle Marine Co. Ltd.(founded in 2007) are seen as "active" in the available detailed data.

The brothers sued journalist and the newspaper  in 2018 after they published the revelations. Cumhuriyet reported that one of the companies shared an address with a company that won a $7 million government contract. In January 2019 a Turkish court sentenced Ünker to thirteen months in jail for "defamation and insult", and separately fined the newspaper for "insult". The prison sentence was overturned on appeal due to a statute of limitations, although the fine was allowed to stand.

United Kingdom
The papers show that the, a private estate of , held investments in two s, the and. Both are of which she is monarch, and nominally appoints governors. Britain handles foreign policy for both islands to a large extent, but Bermuda has been self-governing since 1620. The Duchy's investments included off-licences and  retailer. Labour Party Leader posited whether the Queen should apologize, saying anyone with money offshore for tax avoidance should "not just apologise for it, [but] recognise what it does to our society". A spokesman for the Duchy said that all of their investments are audited and legitimate and that the Queen voluntarily pays taxes on income she receives from Duchy investments.

The papers also show that in June 2007, the, a possession of , invested $113,500 in Sustainable Forestry Management, a Bermuda-based s trading company run by.

Four weeks after the Duchy of Cornwall purchased shares in Sustainable Forestry Management, Prince Charles made a speech criticising the and the  for excluding carbon credits from s, and called for change.

, the 2007 president of the international, said that his $236 million trust revealed in the papers had been established years before by his grandmother with funds that had not been earned in the UK and therefore were not subject to tax there. He said he had first disclosed the trust when he joined the Treasury in 2002, where he was from 2010 to 2013.

An article published by the ICIJ detailing the use of ambiguous policies on the  highlights the $27 million  private jet that  registered there, apparently to become eligible for a $5.2 million VAT refund.

The BBC also noted questions about investments by Conservative Party donor and, owner of.

After reporting began, Appleby sued ' and the ' on 18 December 2017 for as it sought copies of the documents. A confidential settlement between the three companies was reached on 4 May 2018. In a joint statement, the companies stated the vast majority of documents in the leak were not, that the Guardian and the BBC explained to Appleby which documents were used in their reporting, and that the Guardian and the BBC had done this without compromising their journalistc integrity.

Ukraine
Former Ukrainian President is named in the papers. , mayor of Odessa with Russian and Greek citizenships is named as part of a crime gang.

Israel
Jonathan Kolber, former CEO of Koor Industries and the beneficiary of the Kolber Trust and son of former Canadian senator, who set the fund up in 1991, is named.

, Israeli billionaire businessman in s and the founder and President of the DGI Group of Companies appears in 120 documents regarding his relationship with Glencore.

Jordan
is listed in the papers as the beneficiary of two trusts registered in Jersey. One of the trusts, the Valentine 1997 Trust, was valued at more than $40 million in 2015, and its income is to be paid to the queen during her lifetime. The trust also owns property in southern England adjacent to. The other trust, the Brown Discretionary Settlement, is the beneficial owner of a Jersey-incorporated investment holding company with assets worth c. $18.7 million in 2015.

Saudi Arabia
Prince bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, a former deputy minister of defense for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, is given as the owner of at least eight companies in Bermuda between 1989 and 2014, some of them apparently formed for purposes of owning yachts and airplanes.

Syria
, reportedly Syria's wealthiest man, is listed in the papers.

Canada
Three former Canadian Prime Ministers are named in the Paradise Papers:, , and. According to the papers,, Canadian Prime Minister 's adviser and close friend, a Liberal Party fundraiser credited with putting Trudeau into office, moved millions of dollars offshore for former Liberal Party Senator. The offshore maneuvers may have avoided taxes in Canada, the United States and Israel, according to experts who reviewed some of the 3,000-plus files detailing the trust's activities.

Costa Rica
Former president sat on the board of energy company Energia Global International, along with his brother and Timothy Phillips. The company was bought in 2001 by Enel SpA, an Italian power company, for $73 million, plus $37 million in debt cancellation. Figueres resigned from the board that year, at the annual EF meeting in Davos. He was also CEO of from 2000 to 2004, and resigned as a result of allegations he called "unfounded" about $900,000 in consulting fees from a French telecommunications firm.

Mexico
According to the files, trade union leader and politician had investments worth $15.5 million; other mentioned politicians are, , and officials from. High-profile Mexicans in the files include billionaire, priest known as "the greatest fundraiser of the modern Roman Catholic church", and. In an interview with , Gertz Manero, formerly National Security Secretary, denied all knowledge of the company, of which he was vice-president, and which was started by his brother, its president.

United States
According to the papers,  holds stakes in businesses which deal with Russian oligarchs  and  who are subject to, as well as Russian president 's son-in-law,. When reporters working on the Paradise Papers contacted Ross concerning his stake in Navigator Holdings, he did not deny the tie, but the day before his response became public he shorted the stock and apparently made a profit after the stock price dropped 4% after the story appeared.

Other members of the that appear in the documents include former   and former director of the. Offshore ties of more than a dozen Trump advisers, Cabinet members and major donors appear in the leaked data.

Tillerson, while CEO of Exxon Yemen, was a director of a company with a joint venture agreement with a Yemeni state-owned company. He sued when Yemen ended the joint venture and turned over operations to a Yemeni company, and lost. He was still a company director and the offshore company was still active as recently as 2015.

The documents also revealed that, between 2009 and 2011, Russian state organizations with ties to Putin pursued large investments in and  via an intermediary—Russian-American entrepreneur, who befriended Facebook founder  and was a business associate of ,  's son-in-law.

American singer, Microsoft co-founder , American billionaire , founder of , and former supreme commander in Europe General  are also named in the papers.

This list includes some of President Donald Trump's foremost donors, who together funneled nearly $60 million to organizations supporting his campaign and transition. They include casino magnate ; resort owner ; hedge fund managers and ; and private equity investors, , and.

Prominent Democratic donors also appear in the law firm's files. Questions have arisen about donor 's compliance with federal ethics rules. She had pledged to divest from more than 200 firms when she was confirmed as President Barack Obama's commerce secretary in 2013, but records show that she transferred to a company owned by her children's s, which shared the same address as her office.

The late financier and convicted sex offender also figures in the Paradise Papers, as chairman from at least 2000 to 2007 of a Bermudan-registered company, Liquid Funding, Ltd., partially owned by.

Economist and his colleagues estimate that 63% of foreign profits made by American multinational corporations are stored in subsidiaries and offshore accounts, depriving the country of about $70 billion in tax revenue each year.

Argentina
Argentine Finance Minister managed at least two. Neither firm, the –based Alto Global Fund, nor its -based parent company Noctua Partners LLC, were listed in Caputo's financial disclosure statement, a statement that all public officials and candidates for office are required to make. Caputo is a first cousin of local industrialist and construction tycoon Nicolás Caputo, best friend of Argentine President. He told Argentine members of the ICIJ team that "it was an investment fund for friends and family." The funds, opened in 2009 and with over $100 million under management, remained under Caputo's management until December 2015, when Macri named him Finance Secretary, a post upgraded to Finance Minister this January.

Argentine Energy Minister managed two offshore companies, Shell Western Supply and Trading Limited and Sol Antilles y Guianas Limited, both subsidiaries of. One is the main bidder for the purchase of diesel oil by the current government through the state owned CAMMESA (Compañía Administradora del Mercado Mayorista Eléctrico).

According to the papers, Argentine hotelier and real estate developer was director and CEO of half a dozen companies in the  and. Faena also appears with bank accounts in and the, linked to different hotels and real estate projects in. In the offshore firms he was associated with different investors such as Soviet-born British-American businessman ; American billionaire and his brother Robert Burch; American business and media executive ; and French designer.

Brazil
Agriculture Minister is mentioned in the papers. His company, Amaggi and LD Commodities, was first registered about five months after Maggi ended a term as governor of. Maggi told Brazilian outlet Poder360 that he was not a direct beneficiary of the company and he had never received money from it.

, the former Brazilian Minister of Finance, told  that he does not report income from his Sabedoria Foundation because it was set up to perform charitable functions after his death and therefore he receives no income from it.

Chile
Alsacia-Express, which runs the of, holds assets in a Bermuda bank, according to the Appleby documents.

Colombia
President of (2010–2018)  is mentioned in the investigation. He was part of two offshore societies.

The singer, while living in , is a resident of the Bahamas and sends her revenue to Malta.

Public reaction
In the United Kingdom, the public reaction to the Paradise Papers has been relatively muted compared to similar leaks in the past, such as the. Possible reasons include the absence of overt illegality in the information; most media sources are careful to point out that the schemes in the Paradise Papers are generally lawful. A statement on behalf of Queen Elizabeth confirmed that the Royal Estate paid full UK tax on her offshore investments. Other public comments by notable popular public figures who appeared in the Papers may also play a part; Bono stated "I've been assured by those running the company that it is fully tax compliant, but if that is not the case, I want to know as much as the tax office does, and so I also welcome the audit they have said they will undertake." Jack Peat of has suggested that much of the media has ignored the story of the Paradise Papers because those media organisations are owned by individuals implicated in the papers, such as ' owners, ' owner , and ' and ' owner.

After the leak, more than 30 issued an open letter criticizing the British government for failing to take action against the offshore tax industry.

, an elected Deputy of the tax haven, stated that the "coverage was part of a well-orchestrated, ongoing campaign". He also averred that despite having the information since 2016, the timing of the release was deliberately delayed to coincide with the meeting of EU Finance Ministers ahead of the proposed discussion of a tax haven blacklist.

Commenting on the Paradise Papers leak, United States Senator and 2016 presidential candidate warned of "rapid movement toward international oligarchy", saying, "The Paradise Papers shows how these billionaires and multinational corporations get richer by hiding their wealth and profits and avoid paying their fair share of taxes." The leader in the US Senate,, and the ranking Democratic member of the Senate finance committee, , issued a joint statement accusing Republicans of "pushing a reform of the tax code that fails to close egregious loopholes revealed by the leaks."

Litigation
On 18 December 2017, it was reported that Appleby had issued legal proceedings against the BBC and The Guardian for. The BBC and The Guardian said they would "vigorously" defend the action.

Appleby released a media statement to explain the necessity to seek legal action and provided subsequent update. The Guardian and the BBC settled the dispute with Appleby in May 2018.

In October 2018, Swiss-based multinational sought an injunction with the Australian High Court to prevent the use of Paradise Papers documents by the Australian Taxation Office in any legal action against the miner. Glencore asserted that the documents in question are subject to legal professional privilege. Glencore's writ has four plaintiffs: Glencore International AG (an intermediate holding company resident in Switzerland), Glencore Investment Pty Ltd (a company incorporated in Australia), Glencore Australia Holdings Pty Ltd (a company incorporated in Australia), and Glencore Investment Holdings Australia Ltd (a company incorporated in Bermuda). Glencore was unsuccessful in this proceeding and the court held that the ATO could use the documents.

In January 2019, journalist Pelin Ünker was sentenced to a fine and over a year in prison for publishing Paradise Papers material with regard to offshore accounts of former Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim and his sons.

In popular culture
 (2019) is a dark comedy based on the "Panama Papers".