Hedge fund Solo Capital’s founder Sanjay Shah, who has been accused of masterminding a £1.44bn ($1.83bn) dividend tax fraud against Denmark, said that he had depended on others for tax and legal advice in a London court on Tuesday, according to a report by Reuters.
Tuesday marked the first day of a three-week cross-examination by London-based lawyer Laurence Rabinowitz, who represents Denmark’s tax authority Skatteforvaltningen, or SKAT.
Shah, testifying via video link from Denmark, where he is also facing criminal charges in the “cum-ex” dividend trading case, said: “A defect in the law allowed such trades to be legal.”
When asked if he was an honest man, Shah said “yes”.
Rabinowitz said: “You appear to wish to represent yourself as someone incapable of understanding detail and as someone who lacks intelligence.”
In response, Shah said: “I am not holding myself out to be an expert in the tax field.
“At the time, I was a good trader and I was able to obtain knowledge from competitors … and assess risks for myself and execute trades. I was good at some things but I was not good at everything.”
SKAT accuses Shah’s Solo Capital Partners and others of operating a fraudulent “cum-ex” scheme that involved filing incorrect applications for dividend tax refunds on behalf of global investors and companies between 2012 and 2015.
