France took the lead on Thursday in the global crackdown on tax havens by declaring its banks would pull out of tax havens from March 2010.

After a meeting with President Nicolas Sarkozy at the Elysée Palace to discuss measures adopted at last week’s G20 meeting of world leaders in Pittsburgh, France’s top banks said they would shut branches and close subsidiaries in the tax havens on the so-called grey list of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development.