Swedish Citizen made a comment on a previous thread from back in February of 2013. It deserves a wider visibility and reading. It provides a good example of letters that can be used more generically when writing any Countries Finance minister.
Thought I would highlight it here along with a letter he also wrote the Swedish Banksters.
The entire post is after the jump..
Just Me has given me information to stop Reading Brock and start delivering results.
Subject: USA laws in Sweden: Guaranteed to deliver Swedish data to the NSA and CIA
Dear Finance Minister Borg,
You are in the process of accepting the American law FATCA, written by American lawyers, in the interest of Americans. According to Faktapromemoria 2012/13:FPM150 at http://bit.ly/1co9GJX
“Riksgälden och Sveriges advokatsamfund har inga synpunkter på förslaget. Riksdagens ombudsmän (JO), Företagarna, Sparbankernas Riksförbund, Svenska Riskkapitalföreningen och Utländska försäkringsbolagens förening har avstått från att svara”
Have you not done a full analysis and risk analysis upon the USA FATCA regulation and your Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA)?
Have you not demanded that your own jurists review the legal commitment that Sweden is making to USA? Do you make legal commitments without using legal advice?
Do you understand that the definition of “US person” is owned by USA and not controlled by any IGA? You do understand what US person is today, don’t you? Today, it includes many Swedish citizens living in Sweden, some of them who may have never set a foot in USA or ever had any connection with USA. Look it up or refer to my previous emails.
What is the risk of the definition of “US person” changing? Is it controlled in your IGA agreement? (no). The definition of US person changed as recently as this summer in similar situations—have you controlled in your IGA that it isn’t going to change again? (no)
As you are taking upon USA law into Sweden, do you understand that you are taking upon US punishments into Sweden? Do you understand the punishments that are applicable to bank employees? Has your IGA contract specifically protected Swedish bank employees for prosecution under US law? (no—it hasn’t it doesn’t matter whether you have signed an IGA or not.)
Shall be imprisoned not more than 3 years;
Or fined not more than $250,000 for individuals ($500,000 for corporations);
Or both, together with cost of prosecution.
http://bit.ly/17ubMYu
Have you taken into account that the above punishments are US law, and that they are subject to change at any time according to US legislation or US tax rules?
The Swedish tax treaty with USA is unique, in that it requires Sweden to aid in tax and penalty collection to USA. Have you analyzed if Sweden will then be liable to collect fines and/or extradite bank employees to USA?
Are you aware that the IGA you are signing for Sweden commits Sweden to everything yet commits USA to nothing? (that Sweden gets nothing but promises in return?) Reference Rep Posey Letter to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, July 1, 2013.
You are aware that an IGA is not a treaty, aren’t you? A treaty needs to be ratified by a legislative body, and the IGA will not be.
You are aware that the IGA is not connected to the original FATCA legislation, HR 2847, and therefore does not commit the USA to anything?
Have you analyzed the effects of FATCA upon Swedish citizens living in Sweden? (no).
Have you analyzed FATCA’s reporting and mechanisms upon Swedish citizens, regarding discrimination according to national origin? Is it such that certain Swedish citizens are the new Jews? Will they be punished? How? Bankrupted? Extradited? Will they be loaded onto transports and sent off to their fate?
What changes to the discrimination laws will be required in order to search out and find citizens of a particular nationality? Will Eritreans also be searched out and found? Perhaps Muslims? Jews?
Have you analyzed the IGA? Do you realize that it over-rides existing tax treaties?
Do you realize that the information you are sending to USA is not considered as confidential tax information (Title 26 information), rather that it is non-tax information (title 31), and hence not subject to the privacy rules which govern USA tax information?
Have you analyzed the effects of the fact that the information from FATCA and its reporting mechanisms is shared with the NSA, the FBI, CIA and other agencies? Information not only upon US persons, but those that are one contact away from a US person and upon the Swedish FFI financial institutions.
What information from the FFI’s will be shared with the other 3-letter US agencies?
Have you realized that US tax law requires US persons to be financial spies inside Sweden to USA? That these people are then REQUIRED to spy upon Swedish corporations, Swedish spouses, Swedish business partners, and Swedish volunteer organizations? That FATCA requires that US persons (Swedish Citizens living in Sweden) spy upon Sweden?
http://www.irs.gov/file_source/pub/irs-pdf/f90221.pdf
http://www..irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8938.pdf
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8621.pdf
http://apps.irs.gov/app/picklist/list/formsPublications.html?value=3520&criteria=formNumber
http://apps.irs.gov/app/picklist/list/formsPublications.html?value=8865&criteria=formNumber
The private financial information of all family members (those who share joint accounts with the US person) will be reported to the IRS, even if they are full Swedish persons and have no US personhood. See section 3 of the FBAR form foreign “joint accounts”.
Also, trusts which are set up by US persons for elderly Swedish in-laws or any children must be reported.
The private financial information of a Swedish volunteer organization must be reported to the IRS by any US person who may have volunteered to help pay the bills. See sec 4 of the FBAR form.
The private financial information of a Swedish corporation must be reported to the IRS by any officer or person signing corporate checks upon the FBAR form
Form 5471 –A US person shareholder must spy on the entire Swedish corporation.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i5471.pdf
A US person living in Sweden is required to report the private financial information of the Swedish Company to the IRS, Regardless that the company is majority owned by full-Swedish persons.
Form 926, A US person in Sweden must report loans made to a corporation in Sweden to the IRS, even if owned by full-Swedes.
Are you aware that Swedish jurisdiction laws have no effect: The fact that a Swedish jurisdiction would impose a civil or criminal penalty on you if you disclose the required information is not reasonable cause (for not reporting to USA).
Are you willing to have Swedish banks absorb costs which are greater than the gains which USA will gain?
Does Sweden have any backbone? Does Sweden negotiate to have an IGA agreement which (it mistakenly believes) is less bad than the FATCA applications upon its banks?
Is Sweden ready to break international concepts, in making an agreement which is not upon equal terms between nations?
Do you realize that FATCA is simply a method of transferring money from a prosperous Sweden to USA, via compliance agencies and expensive defense lawyers and US banks?
Has your risk analysis been comprehensive? Do you realize that your greatest risk in FATCA relations with USA is the risk that you haven’t discovered all of the risks that lie inside the insane US tax laws?
Without a full analysis of the IGA agreement by US lawyers, how do you know what it is that Sweden is commiting to?
Shouldn’t Sweden be hiring a US lawyer to analyze what Sweden is signing up for? Someone who fully understands US laws? There are many international lawyers in Washington DC and New York City—many of whom have lobbied for FATCA and helped to write the laws. Their fees are between $400 and $2000 per hour, they could be immensely helpful for Sweden to understand what it is that they are signing up for. Why not take some Swedish money and get some real advice upon US law from a US lawyer?
Knowing all of the answers above, please explain what it is that you think is about FATCA that could be a benefit to Sweden.
Swedish Citizen
Got the banksters too,
——————————————————–
To: svenska bankforeningen
Subject: FATCA personal penalties for Responsible Officer, RO, risk analysis Swedish banking
As you are taking upon USA law into Sweden with FATCA and an IGA, do you understand that you are taking upon US punishments into Sweden upon Bank employees? Do you understand the punishments that are applicable to bank employees? Has your IGA contract specifically protected Swedish bank employees for prosecution under US law? (no—it hasn’t it doesn’t matter whether you have signed an IGA or not.)
Shall be imprisoned not more than 3 years;
Or fined not more than $250,000 for individuals ($500,000 for corporations);
Or both, together with cost of prosecution.
http://bit.ly/17ubMYu
Have you taken into account that the above punishments are US law, and that they are subject to change at any time according to US legislation or US tax rules?
The Swedish tax treaty with USA is unique, in that it requires Sweden to aid in tax and penalty collection to USA. Have you analyzed if Sweden will then be liable to collect fines and/or extradite bank employees to USA?
Have you done a complete risk analysis regarding the applicable US laws upon your work? Do you know everything that you don’t know about US laws? Do you understand that US law changes according to what USA decides?
Do you understand that an IGA implemented by Riksdagen & Regeringen permanently and completely subjects bank directors to USA laws?
I hope that Swedish Bank Directors are comfortable and well paid in their roles as Responsible Officers for FATCA, in the IGA that they have demanded from Regeringen and Riksdagen.
Enjoy your Responsibilities!!!!! Keep up the 100% correct work!!!
Swedish Citizen
cc’d the “ledamot” or leaders of each party in the tax department, which is the dept responsible for FATCA in Sweden. cc’d Sophie, and the 2 Pirate Party reps from Sweden in EU:
Excellent work done by Swedish Citizen. Looking forward to seeing the replies.
Good work. FATCA is about America conquering Europe. Why the ministers etc don’t get this is beyond me.
@Moose,
Foreign Attack To Control All
…not just Europe.
@allou. Thanks for your interest. Unfortunately, I expect no answers or a short answer. Of my 200+ Contacts with politicians, I have received zero response. Anders Borg is an exception—his site which is on the administration side states that emails will be registered. His office registered my emails and answered with a response stating what they were doing (not that he cared what I had told him). The last one I sent, I had no question to answer, and I received no response. Today, I have not received the registration number like I had received the other times.
I sent one to the America-lover Folkepartiet Liberal (part of Aldi–Sophie’s association) that answered back in February too, although he is just a staff secretary. No response expected.
I could call them, I could probably reach a third of them, as I did on the first round and had assumed that they would understand the situation of human beings, but they don’t. They will vote with their banks and with the Borg. So, when the NSA sucks up all their citizen’s and Corporations data, we know who helped them do it.
To Swedish Citizen: Do you care if the rest of us use your letter to send to government and media in the countries for which we reside? I would like to use it as a model letter with some adjustments to make it more local. In addition, do you care if it is posted to expat groups and forums to let others know what is going on? I’d like to have your permission before doing so. Thanks.
I would be flattered.
Note that the references to the various IRS forms, where you have to spy on your Company and your spouse and your personal organizations are not written well—they need to say something first and prevent the reader from opening links. Improve it as you will in that area.
It is also a bit long and tries to hit too many Points. Consider if you want to break apart each concept per a particular audience.
(GLenn Greenwald makes releases one by one in a strategic manner, whereas Wikileaks failed by putting Everything in one release)
Swedish Citizen, well, let the government open them, I don’t care. haha. But for the forums, perhaps I should warn people.
Right now, I am attempting to combine your letter, the NZ letter and the Canada letter all into one. Right now I have most of your letter plus 30 other questions for them. I will be mailing it to many departments in Government as well as the Chamber of Commerece and many media outlets in hope to get a bit of attention to this. It is right now about 6-7 pages, it is too long, but I think they can’t answer one of those questions. I might shorten it to three pages and then send another one a few weeks later. But for the forum, I may post the entire letter in two stages. I don’t know yet. So long as you are ok with it, it is a great letter that is very customizable for just about any country. A few things need to be deleted and a few things added, but very good, thank you for doing this, it actually makes it slightly easier for the rest of us to use it.
You can also question if the estate of a dead US person in Sweden, then risks becoming reportable by
–a fully Swedish Swedish person living in Sweden, with absolutely no USA Connection
–any other person
Also, one could question all of the consequences of the estate of a fully Swedish Swedish person living in Sweden, landing in a common estate where one of the persons in the estate is even remotely a US person..
Looking at my own estate, I feel sorry for the heirs.
I’ve had that letter in my head ever since Learning of the REsponsible Officer effects—finally I sat down and put it on (Electronic) paper, and I sent it as an imperfect document rather than waiting for perfection.
I have 2 other FATCA personal homework assignments hanging—one of them so long that I keep forgetting what it is.
@taxconfuzaled
Do you plan to put your consolidated version onto this website as a resource? I hope so as I know how time consuming and difficult it is writing the questions. I was going to do something sililar myself but have not found the time yet. There is no point in re-inventing the wheel.
@taxconfuzaled – I agree with Osgood – please make available please!
HEre is a tidbit from Jatras recent post to use in your countries:
Also significant is the reference to “the principle of sovereign equality” Enshrined and legally binding on all Member States under Article 2.1 of the United Nations Charter (“1. The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members.”), FATCA’s demand to enforce America law on an extraterritorial basis on firms not under U.S. jurisdiction is a fatal flaw under international jurisprudence
Hi all, yes, once I consolidate the two of them, NZ/Can and Swedish one I will post it here for all of you to use it for your respected countries. I had planned to do this because yes, it is time consuming to do that and I am a little concerned already about the organization, but I am starting to think it matters not, the point is to let them see how many questions there are about this and to make them start thinking about what they are about to sign.
I am not going to consolidate every question, because I feel it is too many and some of them may not be relevant to all countries or just creating more questions from questions, but of course it will be customizable, but there will be things in the letter that effect me, but might not effect you. But I will do what I can to minimize that. Right now I have about 31 questions from the NZ/Can one, including some of my own questions and some of my own statements, and I have removed some parts from the Swedish one as the names of departments or things do not exist where I live.
Do you all want me to post that to this thread or do start a new one? I am not even sure I can start a new one… I’m slow, so be patient, it will come…
@taxconfuzaled.
I fear that posting here my get lost quickly, so I would suggest a a new thread. If you are not able to do so, send the material to one of the moderators and they will take care of it. Thanks again for your efforts.
@Taxconfusaled…
I am in the YVR airport right now, but if you post it here, as a comment, when I get to destination, I can pull it out as a separate posting. to have as many questions in varying formats we can get headlined the better… It will probably be 24 hours before I can get back to it, as have a couple long flights as heading to Sydney via China… Yea, why… is a good question? Just for something different!
Another one to Anders the Borg: (in process of cc’ing via email to all of the codependent parties)
USA to tax Europeans with Green Cards, to be enforced by FATCA
There are tens of thousands of Swedish Citizens living in Sweden that USA believes owe taxes to USA, simply because they did not go through a formal process in order to get rid of their USA visa “green card”.
FATCA and the IGA will find them, and Sweden and EU will report them, and Sweden and the EU will help to collect taxes for USA.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p4588.pdf
Here is the information sheet (attached and link above) to the European Citizens who have not known how to cancel their USA greencards during the last 100 years, for which FATCA’s objective is to find their US indicia and tax them.
Likely, Europeans must bring a copy of their USA form I-407 in order to prove to their European bank that they are not US citizens.
Afterall, FATCA assumes that a European is a US person until that European proves that they are not.
And we know that a US person living in Europe is going to be found and taxed by FATCA and the Intergovernmental Agreement with USA.
Since Sweden and EU support FATCA and the application of USA laws inside Sweden, has Sweden and the EU analyzed all of the US laws that are to be applied in Europe?
Swedish Citizen
Ignoring reality, blinders on, no interest in addressing the risks: the answer to the first letter now arrived. Particularly they have not analyzed the fact that Title 31 info (FBARs) do not have USA dataprotection as would Title 26 tax info meant to be shared in the Tax treaty
—————–
Tack för din e-post till Finansdepartementet.
Förhandlingar pågår fortfarande mellan Sverige och USA om ett bilateralt avtal om FATCA.
Faktapromemoria 2012/13:FPM150 som du nämner avser Europeiska kommissionens förslag till ändring av direktivet om administrativt samarbete och omfattar inte informationsutbyte med USA.
Avtalet mellan Sverige och USA kommer att behöva godkännas av riksdagen i Sverige.
Vem som är skattskyldig i Sverige bestäms av svensk lag och vem som är skattskyldig i USA bestäms av amerikansk lag. Ett avtal om automatiskt informationsutbyte påverkar inte en persons åligganden när det gäller skatter och avgifter, utan ger endast respektive skattemyndighet ytterligare information att lägga till grund för sina beslut.
I modellen för FATCA-avtal föreskrivs att all information som utbyts ska behandlas med den sekretess och även i övrigt skyddas på det sätt som anges i skatteavtalet med USA. I Skatteavtalet mellan Sverige och USA anges att all information som tas emot av en stat ska behandlas med samma sekretess som motsvarande information som inhämtas enligt inhemsk rätt. Informationen får bara spridas till personer och myndigheter som är involverade i fastställande av skatt. De personer och myndigheter som tar emot sådan information får bara använda den för att fastställa skatt. De får ge informationen till en domstol.
Vänligen
Official person (name removed)
Skatte- och tullavdelningen
Finansdepartementet
———————
Thank you for your email to the Ministry of Finance.
Negotiations are still ongoing between Sweden and the United States on a bilateral agreement on FATCA .
Fact Memorandum 2012/13 : FPM150 you mention refers to the European Commission’s proposal to amend the Directive on administrative cooperation and does not exchange information with the United States.
Agreement between Sweden and the United States will need to be approved by parliament in Sweden .
Whoever is liable to tax in Sweden is determined by Swedish law and who is liable to tax in the United States determined by U.S. law. An agreement on the automatic exchange of information does not affect a person’s obligations in terms of taxes and duties, but does not give individual tax additional information to base their decisions .
The model for FATCA agreement provides that any information exchanged will be treated with the confidentiality and otherwise protected in the manner prescribed in the tax treaty with the U.S.. The tax treaty between Sweden and the United States states that all information received by a State shall be treated with the same confidentiality as the corresponding information obtained under the domestic law. The information may only be disclosed to persons and authorities involved in the determination of tax. Individuals and agencies that receive such information may use it to determine the tax. They may give information to a court.
Sincerely,
Official person (name removed)
Tax and Customs Department
Ministry of Finance
And Another letter to Anders the Borg
Meddelande: Note that none of the risk questions I had posed are answered.
Note that Sweden (and EU) do not realize that FATCA and FBAR information is NOT tax information and is NOT protected by USA laws regarding privacy of tax information. An FBAR and FATCA is US Treasury information, treated according to “Title 31” USA law categories, whereas personal IRS information (for which tax treaties are strictly limited to) is “Title 26” USA law categories and has strict rules to not be shared with other agencies.
FBAR forms and FATCA information are not USA tax information (they are Treasury information) and are not addressed in the Sweden-USA Tax Treaty.
In my previous letter I pointed out with references that all the FATCA information flows right through the Treasury and into CIA, FBI, and NSA files and is then also stored at the Utah data collection center. FATCA and FBAR data contains private and person information about persons SUSPECTED to be US persons., and also information about the spouses of such suspected persons, the employers of such suspected persons, the business partners of such suspected persons, and any other connected person as is specified by existing or future US law.
@swedish citizen
“In my previous letter I pointed out with references that all the FATCA information flows right through the Treasury and into CIA, FBI, and NSA files and is then also stored at the Utah data collection center.”
From the absolute non-responses to my efforts to raise the conciousness of governement officials and serious press in another Scandinavian nation to these problems, I have come to believe that they simply DO NOT want to deal with it. Probably they are somewhat aware and are hoping that most of their own ciitzens will not be interested enough to question what is happening.
And let’s disturb the newspapers, who are busy writing cooking & vacation tips, or just simply drinking coffee–6 letters to the hacks at the papers I know about:
—————————————————————————————————–
New Swedish Agreement and Laws to Enable USA to tax Swedish Citizens in Sweden
I sent them a letter with the obligations of Green Card holders—I can post it after I confirm that they indeed never considered to write about it (I have low expectations of Swedish media)
I see from the Words that you have selected that you fully understand the local Culture and character of “responsible” Swedish persons.
Avoid conflict. Hope that with the proper amount of time devoted to indecision that the decision is made due to time running out and to the indecision.. Follow the consensus (OECD) and make no verification that the method fulfills the goals.
@Swedish citizen,
I note the wording in one of the answers you got;
…”Whoever is liable to tax IN Sweden is determined by Swedish law and who is liable to tax IN the United States determined by U.S. law…”…
I capitalized the word “IN”. That shows that the mindset of the rest of the world is on tax on RESIDENCY, generally on whoever is a resident IN a country like Sweden.
But, the US asserts the right to tax whomsoever they choose to define as ‘taxable’, WHEREVER they are in the universe, no matter what country they actually live and earn IN, and no matter whether they were also born or naturalized IN other countries . We are struggling with our home country politicians over this ingrained lack of understanding (or willful misunderstanding ) in this respect.
When they say that they ‘respect’ the right of the US to make its own tax laws, they extend it carte blanche to define ‘taxable’ and ‘persons’ as broadly as it chooses, and conveniently ignore that there is increasingly a conflict that is unresolvable between the US system and everyone else. It is easier to sacrifice some citizens, and perpetuate this injustice and aggression by the US than to confront the beast of the US extraterritorial actions. It is easier and more convenient for them to say that they ‘respect’ the rights and laws of the US, than respecting their own home country laws as a sovereign autonomous nation, and the rights of their own citizens and legal residents to justice and fairness.
When I hear countries say that they must ‘respect’ the US right to make their own tax system, that is saying that they ‘respect’ anything, no matter how egregious, no matter how disrespectful of our rights and the their own country rights.
Our Canadian Finance Minister uses that phrasing in correspondence with us and in the media;
..”To be clear, Canada respects the sovereign right of the U.S. to determine its own tax legislation….”
Well, the US can pass all the tax legislation it wants to. And if it further encroaches on the rights, sovereignty, autonomy and tax system of other countries like Sweden and Canada? Well, why doesn’t Canada and Sweden pass their own ‘sovereign’ tax laws to reject or refrain from enacting/enabling FATCA on our own ‘sovereign’ soil? Where is the mutual multilateral ‘respect’? The US has might. There is fear of might, there is no respect.
The US does not respect me as the US citizen and ‘taxpayer’ that it claims me as, and does not respect my home country laws and sovereign autonomous government, nor my rights as a Canadian citizen, taxpayer and resident. I do not have any respect left for the US. Nor should we. It extends none to others.
yup
I’m just about done with it all, once published I will post the link here on where to get it. So far it is 123 questions and very customizable for any country. Stay tuned.