Berlin - German prosecutors are investigating one of the sons of Liechtenstein's ruling prince, contending that he hid money in the Alpine principality from German tax authorities, a statement by the LGT bank said Friday.

Prince Max, 39, who is married and lives in Munich, has been chief executive of Bank LGT Group since 2006.

His father, Prince Hans-Adam II, is in a clinch with German authorities over claims that the principality, landlocked between Switzerland and Austria, is a tax haven, offering trusts which hide and invest the money of rich Germans.

A newspaper broke Friday the story that Prince Max was one of 800 German residents who have been under scrutiny by prosecutors in the city of Bochum since Germany's BND intelligence service last year bought a DVD file containing a stolen list of LGT customers' names.

Max confirmed key elements in the report by the Financial Times Deutschland. The amount of money involved was not disclosed. Prosecutors in Bochum declined comment, saying they were bound by tax confidentiality laws.

The statement from Vaduz-based LGT Group insisted that Max and his family did not receive any dividends from their Liechtenstein trust in the period that they were domiciled in Germany.

He had lived in Germany from January 1999 to January 2000 and ever since September 2001, the statement said, adding that a loan to him from his trust in September 2001 was not taxable income.

German tax authorities alleged that the trust assets were Max's property and that he was obliged to pay income tax on all the investment income as long as he was living in Munich, the Vaduz statement said. His lawyers disagreed.

Max said in the statement that he was already paying "significant" amounts of tax in Germany and had never intended to evade tax.

The newspaper said investigators visited Max in Munich in December after checking with the German Foreign Ministry that Max did not have diplomatic immunity. (dpa)