In the last fifty years, the global offshore economy has grown to such monumental proportions that it has begun to overshadow the global economy itself. This secretive universe of tax havens and unscrupulous accountants, lawyers, bankers, and other related professionals that serve the world’s wealthiest individuals, multinational enterprises, and transnational criminal networks nowadays serves as domicile for millions of shell companies, thousands of banks, funds, and insurers, and over 70% of the world’s shipping tonnage. It also functions as either conduit or destination for about half of all international banking assets and liabilities, over 40% of all foreign direct investment, and a significant portion of the world’s private holdings of art, diamonds, gold bricks, and other valuable commodities. As a result, it is estimated that anywhere between US$11 to US$36 trillion of untaxed wealth is stashed offshore, and that this stash continues to grow by anywhere between US$300 to US$700 billion every year, disproportionately affecting developing countries. Aside from ravaging tax revenues, the global offshore economy also exacerbates income and wealth inequality, perverts fair market competition, weakens macroprudential and microprudential supervision, and undermines global security. Through this course, students will be acquainted with the relevant concepts, theories, and approaches necessary to understand and analyze the historical origins and continuing evolution of the global offshore economy, its structural features and characteristics, its main actors, its day-to-day functioning, and its remarkable resilience in the face of increasingly persistent reform efforts. The course will also provide in-depth coverage of the circumstances and main actors behind these reform efforts, and the factors underlying their successes and failures. Considering that Hong Kong itself has been an integral part of the global offshore economy, the course will be useful to those interested in the city’s role as both a major global financial center and a financial gateway between China and the rest of the world. More importantly, it will be useful to those pursuing careers with national regulatory authorities, international organizations, corporate compliance departments, news media outlets, think tanks, consultancies, NGOs, and other public, private, and civil society sector bodies, as well as to those simply wishing to understand the world better and make a difference.