Steve Klaus highlights another piece in today’s New York Times DealB%k – lot’s of mention of FATCA on banks but not on US Persons. Another good one for Brockers to comment on.
New York Times: “Complying With U.S. Tax Evasion Law Is Vexing Foreign Banks”
…But behind the scenes, foreign banks and financial firms are increasingly finding that complying with the law is a major headache.
Treasury Department officials say they are moving apace in getting the world’s banks on board with the law, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. They say they have reached agreements with some large countries, are working on deals with others and are refining parts of the law, which is set to take effect on June 30, 2014.
But some financial institutions, trade groups, scholars and members of Congress have raised an array of concerns, starting with the cost of creating the complex computer systems needed to track Americans’ accounts.
I hate to point this out, but the countries listed as tax havens indeed can be seen as such!
Yes – you could consider Russia a tax haven if you look at what Gérard Depardieu did.
Yes – you could consider China a tax haven if you include Hong Kong SAR.
Yes – you could consider Panama a tax haven given all the shell and shipping companies registered there.
Yes – every tax jurisdiction can be labeled as a haven. 🙂
at 39.1% Corporate tax rate, every country in the World is a tax haven compared to USA.
@GD
It’s ironic that capitalistic countries like the USA who otherwise support free markets are so keen to uphold the “tax haven” narrative. So called tax havens are nothing other than countries who, for example, are less oppressive, have a stabler political system, less debt, more attractive tax rates, etc.; in short, they’re simply more competitive and offer a more favorable environment for investments. The fact that the USA itself is one of the largest tax havens in the world doesn’t seem to bother them. Typical American hypocrisy.
Boeing moved it’s corporate offices from Seattle to Chicago…because of TAX BREAKS…in 2001…
Corporate TAX HAVENS exist within the USA…what nonsense to consider countries offering the same incentives as somehow different…
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/11/business/chicago-offering-big-incentives-will-be-boeing-s-new-home.html
Various states have paid expenses to companies relocating there—sewer hookups, roads, Electric & water hookups, and worker training expenses.
After speaking with a friend of mine who is close to the financial industry, FATCA for US/Canadians is probably something we will be talking about for the next decade…in other words what I (we) think Canada is doing is watching this fight from afar to see how far the US can penetrate this legislation with other Countries.
Canada would be an excellent test country for RBT. It has a lot of long term U.S. expats most of whom would never owe a dime in U.S. taxes. I still think Victorias idea of having people file one last form after say five years if they have no U.S. holdings and do not own anything there is best. Let it start with Canada. For Canada FATCA is such a waste of money. Really they are not going to catch any “tax cheats” here. As Minister Flaherty stated, people do not flock to Canada to escape taxes.
We’ll see. It has taken so long. I feel that Canada is holding out for something even if they do sign it’s likely going to be a while before they can implement anything. By the time most Canadians find out about this and what a big waste it is financially for Canada it’s going to cause a big uproar there. This is only the beginning. The relationship between these two countries is going to come out worse for all of this for a long, long time.
There is an article comment made by someone claiming to be “Just Me”, which is quite obviously not our “Just Me”. And by the tone, I’d wager it’s from our favourite troll.
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/09/16/complying-with-u-s-tax-evasion-law-is-vexing-foreign-banks/?_r=1&
WE KNOW THIS IS NOT JUST ME. Can anyone flag it or something? I believe this is the same troll who stole my name and Innocente’s name awhile back on IBS and created sick mischief.
Like or dislike is trivial and idiosyncratic –
Bad things happen to people (or IBS) who ignore the law !
Do not mistake straight talk with callousness. Never confuse the law with fairness or morality. They are not related. Laws have no moral force whatsoever and most importantly do not shoot the messenger, even if it is not the message that you want to hear.
It is time to either comply with the law or expatriate. Complaining is just a waste of time and bargaining rarely provides a sustainable solution. To those who fantasize mass salvations like class action and Charter challenge: show me a precedent or two.
@tdott and Em,
Agreed. It’s so obviously NOT Just Me: – the writing could hardly be more different from Just Me’s considerate and even-handed approach! The wording is also very similar (if not identical?) to s.r.’s comment on an earlier article.
May the perpetrator soon receive wisdom…!
Could someone who’s in touch with our Just Me let him know what’s going on, please?
just sent him an email
I just sent him an e-mail. I will also tweet him.
This person’s a real piece of work, isn’t he? He used ‘bubblebustin’ to attack Calgary411 here:
http://taxconnections.com/taxblog/tick-tock-tick-tock-us-swiss-tax-deal-imminent/#.UjpIpRZa_zI
Seems to get his jollies cyber stalking and bullying.
I don’t have a subscription so I cannot read this article. Must be interesting though:
Non-US clients shun US bank foreign branches
http://www.risk.net/risk-magazine/news/2295504/non-us-clients-shun-us-bank-foreign-branches
Just me responded that the “Just Me” label was already taken at NY times the first time he entered.
The New York Times moderation approved a personal attack made by the stalker and marked it as one of the two favorite comments. I’ve reported the stalker to the FBI and emailed the FBI complaint number to their customer service. If this persists, then I’ll file a complaint with the local police to launch a criminal investigation againt the US, like how such has been done with Eritrea.
The following could serve as a guide for making a similar complaint against the US:
swisspinoy,
Put “Non-US clients shun US bank foreign branches” into a search at Google News and you can get to this article. Doesn’t always work, but it does on this particular article.
Good for you in finding how and taking action with the FBI on your cowardly “bogus, not our Just Me” stalker at The New York Times article — and also notifying the NYT that you have done that.
Many hours have passed and the NYT has taken no action, approving the stalking.
NYT insists that it honors the personal attacks made by stalkers:
Yet, their policy conflicts with their claim that they cannot take action against stalking:
I got a response today. It says:
So, I called and they said that it takes about a week for a comment to be removed. Hopefully, they will remove the comment which deserved to be removed.
SwissPinoy,
It sounded to me like they are removing YOUR posts. I hope not!
@WhiteKat, they probably will. Under normal circumstances, they wouldn’t have approved the post past moderation. Such conflicts with their policy. Then, they lied that the post cannot be deleted. Then, they claimed that they will delete my account and when I called them, they acted as if they didn’t know who I was and told me to wait a week. Yet, I’ll give them some credit. They actually responded, stating that they will delete my account. That’s more than just deleting it without saying anything.
Isn’t it unique that the NYT, of all entities, approves a false personal attack of terrorism and refuses to remove it against their policy? One would think that they, of all people, would take such matters more seriously.
My latest email to the NYT:
The offensive post has now been removed. I’m not sure what did it. Was it the FBI complaint, the emails, the customer support complaints, the customer support phone call or the email with attachments that I sent to the New York Times director? This shows that if one is polite, persistent and organized, then justice can be accomplished one little step at a time. 🙂