US Presidential hopeful, Senator John Kerry, has been hauled over the coals for his anti-Bermuda stance - after it was discovered his wife's trust made a killing on Ingersoll-Rand redomesticating to the Island.

Sen. Kerry, of Massachusetts, has been loudly denouncing US companies moving offshore to save on their taxes calling them “Benedict Arnold” firms after the notorious American traitor.

But as the Kerry Campaign hots up, so does the scrutiny of his affairs. Reporters and his opponents have been leaving no stone unturned scrutinising his every move - and that of his wife.

Now the latest edition of Newsweek has revealed that in 2002 the conversion and sale of up to a million dollars of stock in Ingersoll-Rand made between $100,000 and $200,000 after stock rose in price following the company's move to Bermuda. In an article in this week's edition headlined “The Wedge War”, Newsweek looks into the general election campaign and with it how the Kerry camp is faring.

It said of his bid: “And oppo (opposition) types will undoubtedly focus on family financial transactions. One such deal involves the conversion and sale in 2002 of up to a million dollars of stock in Ingersoll-Rand. It was a profitable sale - netting from $100,000 to $200,000 - of a company whose balance sheet was boosted by its decision to move its headquarters offshore to Bermuda.

“So what? Well, one of Kerry's best applause lines is his pledge to end tax breaks for what he calls ‘Benedict Arnold' firms that move offshore - to places such as Bermuda. (Kerry spokesman Michael Meehan said the sale was made by professional fund managers for Teresa Heinz's trust and that Kerry wasn't even aware of it. “Senator Kerry is not involved in the management of her assets,” said Meehan.)

The trust is part of Kerry's wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, from the death of her first husband, Sen. John Heinz, a Pennsylvania Republican, who was killed in a plane crash in 1991.

The Bermuda inversion issue, as it has come to be known, appears to raise its head every year, and it has taken just a month into 2004 to become an issue in the US presidential election campaign.

Democratic front-runner Howard Dean said during a debate last month that America needs a president “who doesn't think that big corporations who get tax cuts ought to be able to move their headquarters to Bermuda and their jobs offshore.”

Kerry introduced a bill in November requiring service representatives to disclose their physical location each time a customer calls to make a purchase, inquire about a transaction or ask for technical support in a bid to find out just who they are dealing with.

The proposal targets the increasingly popular decisions by companies to move their call centres overseas to capitalise on low labour costs.

After his victory in the Iowa caucuses last month, Kerry railed against federal tax incentives to companies that outsource jobs.

“We are not going to give one benefit or one reward to any Benedict Arnold company or chief executive officer who take jobs and money overseas and stick you with the bill. That's over,” he said.

The name of Benedict Arnold, a general in the American War for Independence who switched his allegiance to the British, is a common epithet meaning traitor