Business advisory services company Nexia BT, which was notoriously implicated in the Panama Papers, will be hiving off much of its operations to another company.
The financial services firm, which has been at the centre of high-level money- laundering allegations that have hounded the Labour administration in recent years, will no longer be offering advisory, local accounting, and audit functions.
Replying to a set of questions, Nexia BT managing partner Brian Tonna told Times of Malta that rival firm Reanda Malta will be taking over these areas of his company’s business.
He insisted, however, “other business units” of the firm would continue to operate as at present.
Tonna did not respond to questions over whether he will continue to play a role in the firm.
Earlier this month, a magistrate concluded an inquiry into claims that Tonna had facilitated a €100,000 cut on passport sales for Keith Schembri, the former chief of staff at the Office of the Prime Minister.
The attorney general has moved against publishing the magistrate’s findings, but Times of Malta has reported that the inquiry has been handed over to the police.
Tonna has claimed the €100,000 was a repayment of a loan Schembri gave him in 2012, to help him through costly separation proceedings.
The Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit had flagged the potentially suspicious transactions back in April 2016.
Reanda Malta is owned by auditor Robert Borg who sat on the evaluation committee which awarded a hospitals’ concession to Vitals Global Healthcare.
Times of Malta understands that the deal for the firm to take over much of Nexia BT’s business will come into effect from next month.
Forensic analysis made public as part of a separate magisterial inquiry into the ownership of offshore company Egrant had identified “evidence of suspicious transactions, concealed corporate relationships and other indications of probably money laundering activities” in data seized from Nexia BT.
Despite playing a central role in the Panama Papers scandal, the firm continued to receive government contracts for several years.