The IOR have previously been caught up in scandal with accounts allegedly being linked to mafia activity, particularly during the 1980s before the Vatican tightened up its financial regulations. …

… Vatican efforts to put its finances in order initially accelerated after Pope Francis’s election in 2013. But an economic reform commission he established has since been disbanded and three of its members are currently on trial with the journalists.

Moves to have all the Vatican books externally audited have also been a start-stop affair.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) were appointed in December to do the job by powerful Australian cardinal George Pell, the head of the Vatican’s economic secretariat.

But PwC’s $3-million contract was suspended last week on the orders of a rival department, the secretariat of state, leaving Pell ‘a little surprised.’ ”