EXPATS British Bank Accounts targeted and Limits on using cash and rules to make taxpayers declare foreign bank accounts

Spain will approve a crackdown on tax fraud as Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy redoubles efforts to plug the deficit and convince investors that the surge in borrowing costs won’t force the nation into a European bailout. Limits on using cash and rules to make taxpayers declare foreign bank accounts will be approved in today’s 10 a.m. Cabinet meeting in Madrid, Budget Minister Cristobal Montoro said yesterday. Data reported at the same time will show how much Spanish banks borrowed in March from the European Central Bank as they used its emergency loans to buy Spanish bonds. Rajoy is trying to regain investors’ confidence in Spain’s shrinking economy as the nation’s borrowing costs approach the levels that prompted Greece, Portugal and Ireland to seek European bailouts. The premier, in power since Dec. 21, said yesterday that the country won’t need a bailout and that it is “not possible to rescue Spain.” Spanish 10-year bond yields rose to 5.85 percent at 9:05 a.m. in Madrid from 5.82 percent yesterday, widening the gap between Spanish and German borrowing costs to 408 basis points. The yield has surged from 4.87 percent on March 1 and 5.07 percent the day before Rajoy took over from the former Socialist government. Yields had declined as much as 95 basis points after the ECB said Dec. 8 it would offer three-year emergency loans to banks. Spanish lenders’ holdings of government debt jumped to 220 billion euros in January from 178 billion euros ($235 billion) in November, according to the Spanish Treasury. Their borrowings from the ECB more than tripled from a year earlier to 152 billion euros in February.