On 10 December 2015, the Belgian Parliament voted – in plenary session – the bill “on the communication of information relating to financial accounts, by Belgian financial institutions and the Federal Public Authority of Finance, within the framework of an automatic exchange of information at international level for tax purposes”…. – Continue reading
On Sept. 3, 2015, a bill to amend the Act on the Protection of Personal Information (APPI)1, the main privacy law in Japan, was passed by the National Diet. This is the first major amendment to the APPI since the original version of the APPI took effect in 2005. The… – Continue reading
There are a variety of benefits to moving offshore, yet few would argue the assertion that tax neutrality is paramount among them. As anyone familiar with the phrase “tax haven” would surely recognize, many countries offer strongly favorable tax terms as an incentive to draw new business. Written by CT… – Continue reading
Only time will tell whether the benefit of enhanced compliance and effective enforcement will outweigh the costs. The Common Reporting Standard (CRS) is a new international system for the automatic exchange of tax information promoted by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and modelled on the United States’… – Continue reading
Swiss Senate has sealed the end of banking secrecy for foreign clients, following the House of Representatives in accepting the legal groundwork for the automatic exchange of information. The decision paves the way for a “decorous funeral for tax secrecy,” as senator Roberto Zanetti of the leftwing Social Democrats put… – Continue reading
Edward Snowden is not in jail, but his namesake soon could be. Switzerland has sentenced Hervé Falciani, a former HSBC Swiss bank employee, to five years in prison. He is the whistleblower and leaker often called the “Edward Snowden of tax evasion.” Leaks bank records and tax documents has helped… – Continue reading
Veteran banker says India purchase reflects client demand for onshore private banking advice. Julius Baer’s Asia Pacific head Thomas Meier is preparing to leave Asia after 20 years, but he isn’t leaving Asia behind. The veteran banker, who also worked at Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank, will continue to oversee… – Continue reading
Israeli politicians occasionally risk the ire of their American allies. Some have successfully challenged legislation in court to slow the implementation of FATCA-related legislation. Watch and learn, Hong Kong. As the United States continues to bring country after country to their knees to comply with its Foreign Account Tax Compliance… – Continue reading
Over 90 jurisdictions have committed to the OECD’s Common Reporting Standard (CRS), creating comprehensive global automatic information exchange for financial assets and the entities through which such assets may be held. Over 70 jurisdictions have signed the OECD’s Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement, which implements the CRS. The CRS is scheduled… – Continue reading
The United States is on the verge of economic collapse. It is being tipped over the edge by its own government with an unquenchable thirst for taxes and incurable addiction to spending. The financial system in the United States and everywhere else in the world is in danger of disintegrating… – Continue reading
The clock is ticking for American tax dodgers around the world after BNP Paribas SA’s Swiss unit and two other banks joined a U.S. program to avoid prosecution, revealing the exact methods of Swiss bankers’ legendary discretion. BNP agreed to pay $59.8 million in a program that has brought in… – Continue reading
Globally, taxpayers are becoming more interdependent, and engage in cross-border financial activities with more regularity. With this, comes the need for enhanced co-operation and understanding across countries on issues such as tax administration and transparency, to curb tax evasion and ensure a fair allocation of taxes to tax jurisdictions. “The… – Continue reading
Eight tax treaties and protocols were passed forward for a ratification vote by the full US Senate at a business hearing of the Committee on Foreign Relations on November 10, reports Tax News. The Committee approved the new US double taxation agreements (DTAs) with Chile and Hungary, and protocols to… – Continue reading
Antalya, Nov. 16: The Group of 20 nations today pledged to adopt sound macroeconomic policies to achieve strong, sustainable balanced growth. The near-term objective would be to support growth, create jobs and put debt as a share of gross domestic product (GDP) on a sustainable path. Data show that several… – Continue reading
Luxembourg and Netherlands must recoup unpaid tax from Fiat and Starbucks of €20m-€30 each The European Commission has ordered Luxembourg and the Netherlands to recover unpaid tax from Fiat and Starbucks in the region of €20 million to €30 million each. On October 21st, competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager condemned tax… – Continue reading
The Coalition’s decision to vote down its own measures to crack down on multinational tax avoidance is just the latest instalment in an increasingly unfocused taxation debate Well that’s a courageous decision – in the Sir Humphrey Appleby sense of the phrase. Just as it is encouraging a “debate” about… – Continue reading
What will CFOs be spending their time on next year? Preserving margins and sustaining or improving earnings performance top the list, says Protiviti. What are finance executives’ top priorities for 2016? Consulting firm Protiviti tries to capture them in its 2016 Finance Priorities Survey, released on Tuesday. No matter how… – Continue reading
The implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliant Act is showing consistent progress with thousands of banks in over 150 countries agreeing to share financial accounts data of their US clientele with US taxation authorities. This clearly indicates the firm resolve of the US administration to make this initiative a… – Continue reading
United States taxpayers using foreign accounts in the United Arab Emirates may see more rigorous enforcement of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FATCA, in the UAE, as obligations for UAE financial institutions have been ramped up under a new intergovernmental FATCA Agreement between the U.S. and the UAE,… – Continue reading
Exclusive More than 100 victims of notorious conman Peter Foster have moved to freeze funds held in offshore tax havens after more than $10 million was siphoned from his online gambling company Sports Trading Club. Fairfax Media can reveal Foster and at least eight associates have been served with freezing… – Continue reading
Speed read Europe’s highest court has turned the US into a privacy pariah, and the fallout could have a major impact on New Zealand businesses. Tech companies and cloud computing providers, big and small alike, are staring down the barrel of increasingly uncertain privacy compliance challenges, as are their customers…. – Continue reading
Recent legal changes in Qatar must be understood by chief financial officers (CFOs) and finance professionals if businesses are going to be able to address potential risks, the Institute Of Chartered Accountants In England and Wales (ICAEW) said, reports the Gulf Times. The accountancy body partnered with international law firm… – Continue reading
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev approved the intergovernmental Azerbaijan-US agreement on “Improving compliance with Azerbaijan and the United States of international rules on tax requirements and fulfilling the requirements of the Act on the taxation of foreign accounts (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, FATCA)”. The relevant law is published in the… – Continue reading
Over the last seven years, America has flexed its muscles at tax havens everywhere. With Schwarzenegger-like bulk, the U.S. has crushed Swiss banks and rooted out U.S. account holders worldwide. With its ambitious FATCA undertaking, the U.S. has cowed the world into submission. making foreign banks and foreign governments hand… – Continue reading
Recent legal changes in Qatar must be understood by CFOs and finance professionals if businesses are going to be able to address the potential risks, according to ICAEW. The accountancy body partnered with international law firm Pinsent Masons to host a seminar about Qatar’s recent regulatory changes for senior financial… – Continue reading
Robert Stack, US Treasury Deputy Assistant Secretary (International Tax Affairs), initiated a further push for ratification of the pending protocol to the US tax treaty with Switzerland at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on October 29. Tax treaties and protocols with Switzerland, Luxembourg, Hungary, Chile, Spain,… – Continue reading
FATCA, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, is up and running. If you have foreign accounts or foreign assets, it is an important law that has changed banking and privacy in radical ways. And it has done so worldwide, not just for Americans, but for anyone having even remote American… – Continue reading
Republican and Democratic lawmakers vowed on Thursday to push for the ratification of eight tax treaties which have been held up for years because of one Republican senator’s objections, despite support from companies that want consistency in rules for how to do international business. U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky… – Continue reading
(CNS Business): The use of Cayman Islands funds as a wealth management tool for high net worth Latin American families was debated last week at the STEP LatAm Conference in Brazil, where kidnapping is a constant worry for the wealthy and demand for outbound investments is fuelled by privacy and… – Continue reading
Since the revelations on government surveillance and data capture by Edward Snowden, journalists have rightfully raised concerns about governments’ insatiable appetite for data collection and the resulting encroachment on citizens’ civil liberties. In the EU an individual’s right to privacy is regarded as a human right in accordance with Art…. – Continue reading
Offshore companies are established for a variety of reasons including a company’s necessity to restructure, create an international business entity as well as protect the assets of the company. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is home to three authorities that register International or offshore companies. The three UAE authorities that… – Continue reading
Government has made it easier for Australian companies to avoid paying tax, says Greens spokesperson Adam Bandt Greens MP Adam Bandt has lambasted the passing of new laws that ensure tax details of Australian-owned private companies are exempt from public disclosure rules, saying the government has made it easier for… – Continue reading
At a recent tax conference a senior Justice Department official reaffirmed the commitment of the U.S. Department of Justice to continue offshore enforcement efforts. As is widely reported the official stated: “We are well beyond Switzerland at this point,” she said, citing enforcement announcements concerning India, Israel, Liechtenstein, Panama, the… – Continue reading
Staff at Facebook’s UK arm took home an average of more than £210,000 last year in pay and bonuses, while their employer paid just £4,327 in corporation tax. Facebook made an accounting loss of £28.5m in Britain in 2014, after paying out more than £35m to its 362 staff in… – Continue reading
(CNS Business): Government faces some serious challenges over the next 18 months to update the regulatory regime that protects the country’s financial service sector ahead of a task force inspection in March 2017. Francis Arana, head of the Anti-Money Laundering Unit in the Attorney General’s Chambers, who is coordinating the… – Continue reading
The Department of Justice announced today that Migros Bank AG (Migros) and Graubündner Kantonalbank (Graubündner) have reached resolutions under the department’s Swiss Bank Program. These banks will collectively pay penalties totaling more than $18 million. “It is abundantly clear from the agreements reached to date that for decades, many foreign… – Continue reading
A federal court judge dismissed an attempt to put an early stop to a controversial program in which the Canadian government agreed to share financial information of an estimated one million “U.S. persons” living in Canada with the Internal Revenue Service. Particularly troubling to some opponents is that the agreement… – Continue reading
With the agreement with the US, Vietnam has now signed the double taxation avoidance agreements with 70 out of 170 countries and territories with which Vietnam has trade and investment relations. Double taxation is considered a barrier to trade and investment. It discourages transnational investments while prompts individuals and businesses… – Continue reading
Individuals and business wishing to establish a business in Canada need to familiarize themselves with the laws concerning forms of organization, FDI, competition, taxation, labor, privacy, the environment, and more. Canada has weathered the recent period of international uncertainty and volatility better than most other advanced industrialized nations. It is… – Continue reading
Domestic funds will now have to closely examine FATCA rules. Much ink has been spilt of late over a United States (‘US’) federal law called the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (‘FATCA’) and hence we thought it fit to spend some time trying to analyse for the readers the aspects… – Continue reading
Reevaluating reporting options and investmentsSmart choices and targeted investments today may help contain the approaching resource crunch and the long term costs of compliance FATCA has placed tax reporting front and center with management committees of financial institutions, but it represents just the tip of a potentially larger iceberg. Legislation… – Continue reading
The Swiss cabinet has urged parliament to reject an initiative aimed at maintaining banking secrecy for domestic private bank clients. In recent years, Switzerland’s much-vaunted tradition of banking secrecy has been under constant pressure. On Wednesday the government dismissed calls to anchor the protection of domestic Swiss banking secrecy in… – Continue reading
Security fears; Global authorities to begin sharing sensitive data If you have a bank account somewhere overseas, that information will make its way back to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) in a couple of years. In 2018, international tax authorities will begin automatically sharing financial information under the terms of… – Continue reading
The most controversial part of the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive (4th AMLD) is probably going to be the Register of Beneficial Ownership. The controversy arises since certain information which is considered private and which legitimately could be kept as such, will now be made available to a number of persons… – Continue reading
Aug. 19 — Tax authorities and practitioners around the world are awaiting a Canadian court’s ruling on the legality of Canada’s legislation to comply with the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. The Federal Court of Canada is due to issue by Sept. 30 a ruling on the validity of the… – Continue reading
Singapore-based wealth managers, already under pressure from a global move towards tax information sharing, face a more immediate threat as Asian countries including Indonesia and India look to chase undeclared money in the low-tax city state. A global crackdown on tax evasion launched during the 2008 financial crisis has already… – Continue reading
The following article by Dr Monica Galea John, partner in the Financial Services Department, analyses the manner in which the Fourth EU Anti Money Laundering Directive (the “Directive“) which has just made its way through the EU’s legislation, obliges, for the first time, EU member states to maintain central registers… – Continue reading
Introduction The Cayman Islands have an extremely open, accountable and transparent government and regulatory system. Despite the dated stereotype, the Cayman Islands have promoted transparency regulations and initiatives for many years. In May 2000, the Cayman Islands made commitments to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (the “OECD“) to… – Continue reading
THE South African Revenue Service (SARS) wants to be able to share disclosed financial information with countries with which it has multilateral exchange of information agreements. The ability to automatically exchange information with revenue authorities and with SA’s treaty partners would allow SARS to expand its tax base and help… – Continue reading
Currently, olim are exempt from Israeli tax on overseas income and gains for 10 years. Now that the Israeli election is long forgotten, government officials have circulated their decisions on what state budget proposals should be presented to the cabinet for approval and submission to the Knesset for enactment. Some… – Continue reading
